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Lance Stroll believes that he has developed as a racing driver over the past year, but the 2018 Williams car has masked his progress. The FW41 has proved to be particularly tricky to drive, and the Grove-team currently sits at the bottom of the constructor's standings.
Stroll made his debut last season with Williams but was met with heavy criticism over the course of his maiden year in the sport. The Canadian was out-performed by veteran teammate Felipe Massa throughout the year, before Massa ceased into retirement at the end of the season.
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Stroll has picked up Williams' only points this season after he crossed the line in eighth place in Baku. However, he and teammate Sergey Sirotkin haven't looked close to claiming any more points due to the underperformance of Williams' 2018 challenger.
"There have been some ups and downs but generally I’ve been happy in many ways with my first part of the season,” he said. “As a team, we’re not where we want to be, scoring points. We’ve had our struggles. But I still think I’ve had some good races, I scored points in Baku, I’ve had some other good races, finishing just outside the points. I have had some strong qualifying sessions.
“All in all, I know it’s been frustrating for the team, but from my side, I do believe looking back at last year, over the winter, I have developed as a driver, and this year, a better driver all round.
"The results aren’t showing that because of the struggles we’ve been having. From my side, in many ways it has been positive. I’m going to keep chipping away at it and try and bring more to the table in the second half of the season.”
Fergal Walsh
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Olfacius
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I would imagine that developing as a driver would include improving the car by achieving an understanding of what it needs and working with the team to implement subtle changes for performance gain. Sure it might be a dog, but there must be something somewhere to make it less so and move in a pos... [Read more]