‘I don’t think I did anything wrong’ – Albon on Lap 1 crash that knocked him out of the Mexico City GP

Alex Albon was hopeful of adding to Williams points tally in Mexico City as he started up in P9 on the grid, only to crash out at the very first corner, which he blamed simply on "bad luck".

As the race got underway on Sunday, Pierre Gasly in the Alpine on Albon's right moved over slightly, causing a chain reaction that led to Albon tagging Yuki Tsunoda’s RB. Both Tsunoda and Albon crashed, ending their races on the spot.

“We didn’t have the greatest launch but that was it really,” Albon said. “Obviously, we are all going into Turn 1, fighting for position, it’s a long straight for everyone to fight on. I don’t think I did anything wrong, I don’t think anyone else did anything much wrong either, just seems bad luck.

“It’s been a few races in a row that we’ve had incidents or bad timing.”

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Having started ninth, Albon was chasing a first points score since Baku. But instead, he headed off for an early bath after picking up his second DNF in the past three Grands Prix, to go with a disappointing P16 in Austin.

Team mate Franco Colapinto didn’t have an easy day of it either – something he put down to a poor qualifying, after he exited in Q1, struggling with the balance of his car over one lap. Starting down in P16 on the hard compound tyres, climbing back to the points for a second race in a row was always a tough ask.

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“Starting from P16 with a McLaren and a Red Bull behind, it was always going to be tricky,” he admitted. “We did a good job, I think we maximised what we had this weekend. The qualifying was very tough for us, the car was not in a good place and we were struggling with the rear.

“This track, rear overheats so much when you have a balance like that, and after a slide in T3, a snap in 4, 5 and 6 and it was like a snowball for us in qualifying as the car was not in the sweet spot. Today, we tried to maximise what we had.

“The tools in the car, I think we managed them very well in the race, we tried to do the best job we could to try and fix the balance.”

Finishing in 12th, Colapinto was fortunate it wasn’t lower as he was handed a post-race time penalty by the stewards for his part in a collision with Liam Lawson. The two rookies were fighting for position on fresh tyres late on, both trying to charge back up to the points.

But after going side by side through a series of corners and running each other wide for good measure, the contact led to Lawson dropping down the order, and Colapinto being deemed at fault and penalised. But that wasn’t quite how the Argentine racer saw it.

“He was already behind and he hit me in T1 on the rear right and Liam I think he braked quite late and pushed me off in T1, and he tried to cut back and hit my rear right with his front wing so nothing I could do there,” Colapinto said afterwards.

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“We did I think a decent race. Of course, very hard to overtake, a lot of overheating, so just difficult to manage. But overall, a job well done… we need to move on now to Brazil and score some points there.”

Williams remain eighth in the constructors’ championship, but saw their lead over Alpine cut to just three points courtesy of Pierre Gasly picking up a top 10 finish in Mexico.