F1 star admits concern amid rumours he will follow Nyck de Vries off the grid
Ex-AlphaTauri star Nyck de Vries was the first driver to lose his F1 seat this season and speculation is mounting over the future of a second star on the grid.
The Dutchman signed for Red Bull's sister team this season having shown real potential in his one-off race for Williams in 2022, finishing in the points in ninth place. Having also served as a reserve driver at Mercedes, his full-time spot appeared merit at the start of this campaign, before failing to score a point in the first 10 races.
That led to an impromptu departure, leaving Logan Sargeant as the only full-time driver in the standings still stuck on zero points. Having previously competed in Formula 2 and Formula 3, the 22-year-old American replaced Nicholas Latifi, but has struggled to make an impression in his first 12 Grand Prix events.
There have been flashes of promise, having come perilously close to the points with an 11th placed finish at Silverstone which followed coming 13th in Austria, but Sargeant has also been prone to rookie errors. And partner Alex Albon registering three top-10 finishes has left the British team in no doubt as to who is the No 1 driver.
Despite rumours he’ll be replaced, Mirror Sport understands Williams are not actively looking to replace Sargeant and that he almost certainly won’t be going before the end of the season. That's despite the driver admitting his campaign has thus far been underwhelming, despite recent improvements.
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"Over the last few rounds, I feel like I'm much closer," he told . "I feel like I've seen really good progression as of late and that's the most important thing. I think I need to clean some things up. I think, as a team collectively, we can clean some things up and that's what we need to focus on going into the second part of the season."
The FW43 vehicles have struggled for pace in comparison to rivals, but Sargeant also argued he's now adapting to the difficulties: "It's actually very, very small things but small things that make a big difference," he added. "There were points in the year where I was simply holding the brake too late into the corners and slowing the minimum speed down too much. I've gotten on top of that.
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Logan Sargeant has yet to score an F1 championship point (Getty Images)"Just inputs in high-speed corners, causing instabilities, things like that. There are countless things. It's all just very minor driving traits that needed to be adjusted."
Despite being tagged by the notion of no points so far, Sargeant has also refused to be drawn on whether he needs to address that by then end of the season to secure his seat for 2024. Instead, he remains focused on simply handling the car to the best of his ability.
"We don't always have a car to score points, so it just comes down to me feeling like I've done everything I could, gotten everything out of it, start stringing things together better," he said. “Wherever that leaves me, that would be what I consider a success in a weekend."
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