Sainz is 'frustrated' over the halt in development for the 2025 car.

      "Our choice is not to invest in this year's car."

      Carlos Sainz expresses his frustration regarding Williams' decision to effectively halt all development of this year's Formula 1 car. After a challenging initial adjustment phase, the Spaniard is finally finding his footing in his new vehicle after four years with Ferrari. Displaced by Lewis Hamilton, his options for 2025 were mostly confined to midfield teams, but Williams team principal James Vowles believes that Sainz’s ultimate decision has proven to be the right one. "I’m very proud that Carlos trusted me, and I hope the world recognizes what he saw," he shared with AS newspaper. "Carlos is crucial to our advancement this year."

      However, that advancement is now likely to come to a complete stop, as Sainz, age 30, reveals that all development of the 2025 Williams car has been terminated. "I believe this car has a lot of potential," he expressed in Miami. "If we were able to truly develop it and implement the improvements I could suggest to the team for the wind tunnel, and enhance two or three aspects of the car that currently need work, I'm confident the team could make significant progress," Sainz told DAZN.

      He shared, "Our choice is not to invest in this year's car and to allocate the entire budget and wind tunnel hours toward the 2026 car, concentrating on that."

      "It makes me angry because when you realize you're just three tenths from pole and you can still see the great potential ahead of us, in only my sixth race, and with a car that still has several areas that I'm not satisfied with, I would have liked to see what we could achieve."

      "But for this year, I believe this is the best outcome we can anticipate. We’ll do a little better or worse circuit by circuit, but it is what it is."

      Sainz concluded by stating his support for Williams’ strategy, while Vowles noted that there are indeed some new components on the way for the 2025 car. "We have performance improvements coming," Vowles mentioned. "There’s a rule change at race nine that requires everyone to change their front wing, and we're seizing this opportunity to enhance our performance. Additionally, we’ll have a few more updates, although they are minor. We’ve discovered small improvements over the past months. But the main focus is 2026. Everything we do will add a little more performance to this year's car, but nothing for 2026 will be compromised."