Sainz hails ‘life lesson’ after sealing first Williams podium in Azerbaijan
The Spaniard has endured a difficult campaign since leaving Ferrari for the Grove-based team, arriving in Baku on the back of six consecutive Sundays without scoring a point.
Carlos Sainz admitted he struggled to put into words "how good this feels" after securing a remarkable first podium with Williams at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.
The Spaniard has endured a difficult campaign since leaving Ferrari for the Grove-based team, arriving in Baku on the back of six consecutive Sundays without scoring a point. But his fortunes turned dramatically as he delivered the second-fastest time in a chaotic qualifying session, before holding his place inside the top three across the 51 laps. Only Mercedes' George Russell found a way past, leaving Sainz to claim third place.
"Honestly, I cannot describe how happy I am or how good this feels," said Sainz after the race. "It tastes even better than the first-ever podium that I did.
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"We've been fighting hard all year and, finally today, we just proved that when we have the speed. We've had it all year, and when everything comes together, we can do some amazing things together.
"We nailed the race – not one mistake, and we managed to beat a lot of cars that, yesterday, I wasn't expecting to beat."
Although points have been scarce in recent weeks, Sainz has often demonstrated the underlying pace of the Williams, with misfortune, technical issues and collisions denying him stronger results. Reflecting on how satisfying it was to turn qualifying promise into a podium finish, he praised the resilience of the entire outfit.
"I'm extremely proud of everyone at Williams for pushing through a very difficult year," he said. "We've proven to everyone the massive step that we took compared to last year. We are on the rise, we are heading in the right direction.
"Unfortunately, with me, we've had a lot of bad luck, a lot of incidents, and it was very difficult to convert all of that pace into results. But now I understand why it all happened, because the first podium needed to come like this, and it's just life. Life sometimes brings you those bad moments to give you a very nice one, and this tastes much better than anything I was expecting.
"A life lesson – to keep believing, to keep trusting the team around you, your procedures and everything around you, because sooner or later, it always pays off."
