Formula 1 | Albon: I was one of the least prepared drivers for F1

Alex Albon arrived in F1 at the start of the 2019 season with Toro Rosso. However, the driver recalled by Red Bull should have defended the colors of Nissan in Formula E. But a call at the last moment from Helmut Marko redirected him to Formula 1.

« It happened at the last minute » Albon said. « I don’t want to go into detail about how it all happened. But it was tricky because obviously with the Nissan contract and all that stuff, it didn’t make it as easy as I would have liked to move from Formula E to F1. »

« Obviously, as a driver my age, I always wanted to be in Formula 1. It’s everyone’s goal since childhood. But yeah, we just had to come to an agreement, and once the agreement was settled, it was good. »

He recalls that the possibility of a move to F1 was settled at the last moment, during the end of his F2 season, in 2018: « The process was very quick. And at no time, until Russia, did I think F1 was possible. »

“I had gone a long time without ever being part of a program, never really being approached by a program, never having this opportunity. And then suddenly, literally, in the last two races of my Formula 2 career, I had this opportunity and I was in F1. »

Albon had never driven an F1 single-seater before his first official tests, during the winter tests of the 2019 season: « I was one of the least prepared drivers to arrive in F1, because I think everyone did some testing before arriving in F1.

« But my first lap was literally the first day of Barcelona winter testing, and that was it. And I spun! I spun straight away. I I spun in Turn 4. And I was like, ‘God, what did I get myself into?' »