Team advised to ignore sprint race for feature race success

Former Formula 1 world champion Damon Hill has provided his thoughts on the shape of one of his former teams heading into the Chinese Grand Prix weekend.

The first event of its kind at the Shanghai International Circuit since 2019 kicks off this weekend, with the first sprint race of the season set to take place with a revised format.

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As opposed to 2023, where Saturday was strictly used for sprint events during various weekends, 2024 sees main race qualifying revert back to a Saturday, once all the sprint action has been concluded through a mini Friday qualifying and the sprint race itself on a Saturday morning.

Particularly due to the fact F1 cars have not raced around the circuit for five years, the weekend is set to be rather unpredictable, with no previous relevant data available for teams, and just the one practice session before sprint qualifying.

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Williams' sprint race dilemma

Hill believes that this could have extra ramifications for one team in particular, following a tumultuous few weeks.

Unpreparedness heading into the season led to a situation where Williams were only able to run one car at the Australian GP, due to not having a spare chassis available following Alex Albon's crash in practice.

With Logan Sargeant then receiving the repaired chassis for the Japanese GP, Albon suffered a huge shunt on the first lap of the race in the other car, prompting concerns that the team may struggle to field both cars once again in Shanghai.

Now, Hill has suggested that Williams may attempt just to get through the first few sessions of the weekend, knowing that only a top eight finish receives points in a sprint race.

"Given it's a sprint, the jeopardy is double now isn't it and oh my god I wouldn't want to be James Vowles, I don't know what I'd say to them all right now," Hill revealed on the F1 Nation podcast.

"I mean I'd probably say 'I tell you what, go out, do a couple of laps, bring the car, park it and we'll start at the back, just stay out of trouble, let's get to the race, let's get to qualifying and forget this sprint business.'"

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