Both Williams drivers put their names to new contracts over the shutdown. On Friday at Zandvoort, James Vowles conceded how nearly that went the other way — and Carlos Sainz spent the day making the case for the doubters.
"I was concerned about losing both because they are world championship-material drivers that deserve the opportunity to be fighting for podiums or more, and we haven't delivered that," Vowles told Crash.net and other media in the Netherlands.
There was no attempt to dress up the season. "We are way off where we wanted to be. We have a car that was overweight, late and not to the performance specification that we wanted it to be. So those are just facts."
Williams began 2026 expecting to be knocking on the door of the podium. It reached Zandvoort five race weekends without a point.
"So for us to move backwards this year isn't just a surprise to the drivers, it's a surprise to everyone. And that will always create the risk that we could lose them," Vowles said. "What I'm thankful for is the moment we had problems, they stood by our side. It wasn't finger pointing, it was actually 'tell me what I can do' and they both came into the factory, spoke to the whole organisation and gave them a lift."
They did not, however, commit equally. Sainz signed multi-year. Alex Albon signed for twelve months.
Albon sent the question upstairs. "That's possibly more [a question] to JV than to me. I want to see what the team can deliver. I want to see a strong bounce back from this year. We talked about the performance of the car, but there have been a lot of areas as a team that we haven't delivered on, whether it's the quality of the car or, clearly, the weight, or missing testing."
He has read the internal diagnosis and believes it. He simply wants to see the repairs before extending further. "In my head, I'm satisfied with what those reasons are. As simple as that, really. At the same time, I also want to see these things materialise, and I want to see these changes happen next year."
Sainz set no such condition. "I don't think it's part of my character to jump ships when the situation is at its worst," he said. "I think I told everyone also how committed I am to this project two years ago, how excited I was about it. And the first time there is a bump on the road, a big bump, probably bigger than anyone could have imagined after the podiums of last year, I don't think it's part of me, my way of being, my character to jump ships at the first possible opportunity."
Friday tested that. Sainz left the circuit three times inside the one practice session — wide at the penultimate corner, and twice unable to slow the FW48 for the Hans Ernst Bocht at the end of the back straight. Parts broke, and what replaced them was inferior.
"We damaged quite a lot of parts on the car, so in my FP1 I couldn't run with the right components and the components that we have to put on the car for the rest of the weekend are not the best in terms of downforce and performance delivery," he said. "We are a bit tight on everything until we get the upgrade in Baku and unfortunately the gravel in this track is quite aggressive and it breaks quite a lot of parts of the car."
Eighteenth followed, 0.120s outside SQ2, and then a summons for driving unnecessarily slowly under Article 12.2.1.i of the International Sporting Code.
"Car 55 had to let Car 16 by before Turn 13, this impacting his lap time delta," the stewards wrote. "After that, the driver accelerated to make up time before coming into the pits, but still reached the Safety Car Line 1 being approx. 5 seconds above the required maximum time. The driver explained that he could not accelerate the car in the way he wanted due to the fact that the battery of the car was empty, but also admitted that he could have done more to make up time before entering the pit lane."
The penalty was a warning. Albon made it through SQ1 and starts 16th.
Williams was among five teams bringing no new parts to Zandvoort. What Vowles is selling instead is a new tub, meant to finish 2026 and carry forward into 2027 — none of which is visible on the car this weekend.
"I can't tell you everything that's going on behind the scenes but I can tell them," he said. "And if they are re-signing it will give you an indication that there's a lot of change ongoing and they believe in what the future looks like."
Sainz has committed through 2027 and beyond. Albon has committed until he sees results.