James Vowles issues apology to Carlos Sainz for poor Belgian GP pitstop

Williams team principal James Vowles apologised to Carlos Sainz for a poor pitstop during the Belgian Grand Prix

Williams Racing team principal James Vowles has issued an apology to Carlos Sainz after a "poor" pitstop during the Belgian Grand Prix.

Sainz finished the grand prix at Spa-Francorchamps in 18th position, whereas his team-mate Alex Albon scored eight points for the Grove outfit with a sixth-place finish. Saturday was a better day for Sainz as the Spaniard finished the sprint race in sixth, scoring three points.

"A strong weekend for us with Carlos finishing P6 in the sprint race and today Alex finishing P6 in the main feature race in difficult conditions all round," Vowles explained during a debrief video.

"With Alex, he drove a faultless race, didn't put a foot wrong. We did a good pitstop, good strategy in order for him to hold onto that P6, and he defended against Lewis near enough all race long.

"In the case of Carlos, we took a gamble this morning that the race would be wet for longer. So we, as a number of other teams did, fitted a slightly larger rear wing. In the end, we only did around about 10 laps in those inter conditions, and that car's just quite a bit slower in drier conditions, so that did not pay off today.

"But from where we were starting, it was a sensible choice to try and provide some learning, understanding, and opportunity to Carlos later on in the race. His pitstop was poor, and for that, I apologise. We will tidy that up and make sure that as we progress across the season, we operate at the highest level possible.

Carlos Sainz, Williams

Photo by: Zak Mauger / LAT Images via Getty Images

"Going forward though, what I'm encouraged by is this package is working. It was a strong weekend. You can see the car performance has actually bounced back again. Still a tight midfield, but I'm looking forward to these next races where we'll also deliver."

Williams currently sits fifth in the constructors' standings with 70 points - a 27-point lead on Sauber in sixth.

Formula 1 now heads to Budapest for the Hungarian Grand Prix, set to take place on 1-3 August.