Williams team boss James Vowles has shed light on Alex Albon’s surprise disqualification from qualifying for the Dutch Grand Prix on Saturday, revealing that the exclusion was due to the team’s “incorrect measurement” of the FW45’s new floor element.

Alex Albon secured an impressive eighth place in grid deciding practice, a performance that was the team’s best of the season.

Unfortunately, a technical inspection after the session revealed that the floorpan of the Anglo-Thai racing driver’s Williams exceeded the prescribed dimensions of Formula 1.

Vowles explained that the team had carried out several scans of the car ahead of this weekend’s race and believed it was compliant with regulations, but FIA measurements had shown that the floorpan was too wide.

“The fact is that we were disqualified because the floor was too wide,” Vowles explained in a video posted on social media.

“The floor we have here this weekend, actually the whole bodywork and many parts are all new.

“It is not the first time we have been scanned. We obviously follow and have followed all of these procedures since they were introduced several years ago and so far no violations have been detected.”

Vowles further clarified that Williams had carried out several inspections at its site in Grove and on site in Zandvoort and had found no irregularities.

“We now use scanning techniques instead of physical measurement techniques because you have to consider not just a single point, but heights and widths across some quite complex shapes,” he explained.

“Before we came here, we scanned the floor and the car several times. It happened in isolation with the floor at the factory, it happened with the car at the factory, it also happened here on Thursday.

“And we have presented all these results to the FIA, which indicate that our lower limit complies with the legal requirements. But what is decisive is the FIA’s decision, their measurements and their systems, and we fully accept that.”

As promised, James provides an update after Alex’s disqualification. pic.twitter.com/9qBJoFGGNW

— Williams Racing (@WilliamsRacing) 25 August 2024

Williams now wants to find out why the measurements were wrong and is working on a quick fix to avoid future problems.

“What we need to do now is understand how we could have been wrong in our measurements and what we need to change immediately in our processes,” Vowles added.

“There is only one area of ​​the car where we have not complied with the regulations and it is easily fixed. But whatever the rule, it is the rule and in this respect everything is very clear.”
Vowles stressed the importance of complying with regulations and taking responsibility for the mistake.

“We can’t spend hours developing an update kit. We can’t ask our drivers to put everything on the line to secure points positions, only to throw it away because they don’t meet every single limit of the regulation,” he said.

“And no one is really responsible for this except ourselves. This is on our shoulders. No one else has any responsibility. We need to address this immediately and get it under control.”

The disqualification was particularly frustrating for Williams as the updated FW46 had shown promising performances all weekend.

“The performance of the car has been positive,” explained Vowles. “We’re in a situation where this update is now producing good results. And in a very tight midfield we were able to get the car back to third place in qualifying, back in a position where we can score points today.”

“This is also reflected in a long run on Friday, which was again positive. We were able to pull away from the midfield and at times were even in a situation where a long run overshadowed Ferrari’s.”

“It’s a completely different situation than what we experienced (compared to) the beginning of the season.”

Despite the setback, Vowles remains optimistic about Williams’ prospects for the remainder of the season.

“We still have something ahead of us, this race weekend, where I think we have a car that is strong enough to be able to fight our way through the field,” he continued.

“I’m excited about today’s prospects because the car is still fast and we have a chance in the race. And on top of that, we still have nine more races ahead of us in which we will have to keep delivering perfect performances to score points and fight our way up the championship.”

“That’s not the standard we’re supposed to be following this weekend, but let’s make a process change now to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”

Stay up to date with all F1 news via on facebook. And Þjórsárdalur