Williams duo warn 2022 F1 car visibility "worse in some corners"
The British team initially revealed its 2022 livery on a show car on Tuesday afternoon before it’s actual car - the FW44 - broke cover and hit the track.
Having had their first opportunity to sample a 2022 car for real in wet conditions, both Latifi and Albon reported that visibility has noticeably reduced due to the new 18-inch wheels and deflectors.
Their comments follow a warning from reigning world Max Verstappen that F1’s new taller 2022 tyres will restrict drivers’ views more than before.
“Firstly the visibility, it is worse in some corners,” Latifi said. “I guess it just depends on the kind of corner, how you’re steering into the corner and where your gaze is going.
“I think that will just be something that everyone has to get used to, but there are definitely instances where you do see less for sure.”
Albon, who was released from his Red Bull development role to replace Mercedes-bound George Russell this season, expects visibility to be a particular challenge when racing at street circuits.
“Today, we had kind of the worst of it, a dark, gloomy, wet day at Silverstone,” the Anglo-Thai driver explained. “But it wasn’t too bad.
“I think we’re going to struggle more when we go to street tracks, when we come towards Monaco, Baku, Jeddah, that’s going to be the tricky ones.
“Because on open tracks, you can see far ahead of you. With the blind spots of the tyre and the deflectors it takes away a lot that immediate view, kind of as you’re looking into the corner.
"So what you end up doing is you’re looking actually further around the corner, which on a street track past a wall, there’s only more wall! So you can’t see much around it.
“So I think that’s going to be the tricky one and also just combat driving, I think that’s also going to be something a little bit trickier to see where you are, where the front wing is, where where your tyres are.
"That might be a little bit more tricky.”
Albon added there was “nothing stand out” he noticed during his first drive in F1’s new generation of car.
“Honestly, it feels like a racing car,” he said. “It feels pretty decent out of the box. It’s hard to say with the promo tyres and, and a lovely wet track in the UK, but it all feels pretty normal.
“Nothing stand out at the moment. I think once we get towards the latter end of testing, when we start seeking the true gains with the car, putting it on its limits, then we’ll really see what the car is like on the limit.
“But I can say for now, especially today, both Nicky and I weren’t pushing that hard.”
