FILE PHOTO: Williams Racing Formula One F1 driver Alex Albon attends the Williams FW46 car unveiling and launch event ahead of the 2024 F1 season in New York City, New York, U.S., February 5, 2024. REUTERS/Mike Segar/File photo
ZANDVOORT, Netherlands (Reuters) - Alex Albon welcomed the challenge of having Carlos Sainz as his Williams team mate next season and said he hoped they could lift the former champions back up the Formula One pecking order.
Spaniard Sainz is leaving Ferrari to make way for incoming seven-times world champion Lewis Hamilton and his move to Williams was announced as the sport headed into the August break.
"It will be a challenge of course, I think Carlos is very highly regarded, I welcome it," Albon told reporters at the Dutch Grand Prix, the start of the second half of the season, on Thursday.
"It's great to have that competition and I enjoy that... we'll be able to learn from each other."
Albon said Williams would be a very different environment for the Spaniard, with the focus on improving the car and creating a team capable of regularly fighting for points.
Williams are ninth of the 10 teams, with only four points from 14 races -- all scored by Albon whose American team mate Logan Sargeant will be leaving at the end of the year.
Albon also has top team experience, the British-born Thai joining Williams in 2022 after a year out following a stint as team mate to now-triple world champion Max Verstappen at Red Bull in 2019 and 2020.
"I think we'll push each other hard," he said of Sainz.
"Especially interested to see what his feedback is. You kind of have a lot of things that you want to try and change, things which he will have found over his time with the new generation of cars that he can bring over to Williams.
"I've spent three years now driving a Williams and you kind of get quite used to driving that and it's nice to have that fresh look on things and especially for it to be at a top team, it always helps."
Sainz has been at Ferrari since 2021, alongside Charles Leclerc. Before that he was with Lando Norris at McLaren, had a stint with Nico Hulkenberg at Renault and started alongside Verstappen at Red Bull-owned Toro Rosso (now RB) in 2015.
(Reporting by Alan Baldwin, editing by Clare Fallon)
