Stroll still enjoying F1 despite Williams' struggles

Lance Stroll has stressed he is still enjoying life in Formula 1 despite Williams’ ongoing struggles, finding motivation in seizing the opportunities the team may get to pick up points and punch above its weight through 2018.

Williams has sat firmly at the back of the F1 grid so far this season, with Stroll scoring its only points of the year so far at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix when he capitalised on a race of attrition to cross the line eighth.

The team has otherwise struggled to fight in F1’s midfield, with Stroll and teammate Sergey Sirotkin both being knocked out in Q1 on six occasions in the opening eight races.

Despite Williams’ lack of performance on-track and dim prospects of making big strides through the remainder of the season, Stroll was adamant he was still enjoying life in F1.

“For sure, it beats a blue-collar job!” Stroll joked. “There’s opportunity. The nature of the sport is good. There’s good cars, there’s bad cars. It changes year by year. As a driver, you always have to try and extract the most out of what is available to you.

“I’m still very young. This is part of the process of being in Formula 1. Last year I was fortunate enough to experience standing on the podium, start on the front row. I had a lot of races where I was in the points. That was great. This year, it’s a bit of a challenge. We’re in a different position.

“That’s adversity you face in motorsport sometimes. You just have to overcome it and look at the bigger picture. We’re in the situation we’re in. I’m still getting in the car everyday and challenging myself.

“Even in other things, even though the qualy positions aren’t great, I look at some of my starts this year and stuff, I enjoy that. It’s an opportunity to make up for some of the difficult qualifying sessions we’ve experienced as a team this year. It’s things like that. That can then lead to a good race with a lot of carnage and stuff, so you never know in racing.

“You always have to keep your head down and get ready to capitalise on any opportunity.”

Stroll is yet to finalise his plans for 2019, and when asked if he could imagine he would still be racing for Williams, the Canadian remained coy, saying he was not yet thinking about his future.

“I can imagine a lot things, I have a big imagination! We’re not going to get into detail about it, I’ll stick to racing,” Stroll said.

“We’ll see, we’ll see. Race by race. What is it, round nine this weekend? There’s a few more rounds to go before everyone figures out where everyone is next year.

“I’m just trying to make the most of where I currently am.”