{"id":78877,"date":"2025-08-18T14:19:07","date_gmt":"2025-08-18T14:19:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/78877\/"},"modified":"2025-08-18T14:19:07","modified_gmt":"2025-08-18T14:19:07","slug":"williams-verstappen-claim-amidst-renewed-albon-rumours","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/78877\/","title":{"rendered":"Williams’ Verstappen claim amidst renewed Albon rumours"},"content":{"rendered":"

Amidst claims that Red Bull\u2019s Thai owners want to bring Alex Albon back into the fold, James Vowles says his driver is up to the task of having Max Verstappen as a team-mate.<\/p>\n

But that doesn\u2019t mean Albon is going anywhere.<\/p>\n

Alex Albon a \u2018completely different animal\u2019 to his Red Bull days<\/p>\n

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher<\/p>\n

Albon was parachuted into a Formula 1 race seat in 2019 having been called up by the Formula 1 team as he geared up to race for Nissan e.dams alongside S\u00e9bastien Buemi in Formula E.<\/p>\n

He contested all of 12 grands prix with Red Bull\u2019s sister team, Toro Rosso, before replacing Pierre Gasly at the senior outfit alongside Verstappen.<\/p>\n

But a year and a half later, after two podiums and almost 200 points, Albon was demoted to a test driver role with his Red Bull seat going to Sergio Perez.<\/p>\n

His numbers today, lining up against Verstappen\u2019s team-mates, don\u2019t look as concerning as they did back then.<\/p>\n

So much so, Albon\u2019s new team boss Vowles reckons the driver could take on Verstappen in a head-to-head battle.<\/p>\n

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Declaring that Albon is \u201cabsolutely flying everywhere\u201d, the Williams team boss reckons three and a half years on from leaving Red Bull, Albon has the tools to fight Verstappen.<\/p>\n

When asked if he underestimated Albon before Sainz\u2019s arrival, Vowles told media including PlanetF1.com: \u201cIt\u2019s an interesting talk that I haven\u2019t had with him yet.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe will always say \u2018I\u2019m as quick as he is\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe simple fact behind it is, if you put him up against Max today, he would be a completely different animal to what was there before.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd I think that\u2019s the clear element behind him.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe way I\u2019m perhaps adjudicating him isn\u2019t just about how fast he is in the car, he always has been.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut [it\u2019s] actually how resilient he is to everything, things going wrong around him, and how strong he is in that circumstance.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo I think his peak level has it probably has it gone up a lot? Probably not. Is the ability to get there every time there? Yes, that\u2019s what I\u2019m seeing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Albon, who joined Williams in 2022 and has since led the team\u2019s charge, is being linked to a return to Red Bull.<\/p>\n

According to Formule1.NL, Thai ownership \u2018would love\u2019 to sign Albon and bring him back to Milton Keynes. Chalem Yoovidhya, who owns 49 per cent of the team, has a good relationship with his \u2018fellow compatriot\u2019.<\/p>\n

Albon, though, has a deal with Williams that reportedly runs through to the end of the F1 2027 season.<\/p>\n

Read next: One \u2018big\u2019 move next season? F1 2026 Williams driver line-up?<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Amidst claims that Red Bull\u2019s Thai owners want to bring Alex Albon back into the fold, James Vowles…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":78878,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[3026,49,48,578,576,577,1613,44,82,1196],"class_list":{"0":"post-78877","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-formula-1","8":"tag-alex-albon","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-f1","12":"tag-formula-1","13":"tag-formula1","14":"tag-home-page","15":"tag-news","16":"tag-sports","17":"tag-williams"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78877","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78877"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78877\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/78878"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78877"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78877"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78877"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}