- Carlos Sainz still targets a Williams world title despite a bruising 2026 season.
- The FW48’s weight problem dropped Sainz two seconds off the pace.
- Sainz leaves the door open for 2027, but won’t name interested teams.
Carlos Sainz says he still wants to win a Formula 1 world championship with Williams.
The Spaniard made that clear ahead of the Monaco Grand Prix, telling reporters his faith in the project remains firm. “If you give me a good car, I can win world championships,” he said.
The dream that pulled Sainz to Grove
Sainz joined Williams for 2025 after losing his Ferrari seat to Lewis Hamilton.
He had other options, including approaches from Mercedes, Red Bull, Aston Martin and Audi’s incoming works team. He chose Williams and team principal James Vowles’ longer rebuild instead.
His reason was never a secret. “My dream is still to win the World Championship with Williams,” he said. He had said the same in 2025, explaining that his ideal plan revolved around making the team champions again.
“I was clear in 2025 when I said that in my ideal plans, everything revolved around making them champions again.”
It is a statement of intent from a driver who has consistently framed the Grove outfit as a project worth seeing through.
A rollercoaster first chapter
His first season at Williams was uneven. A difficult start gave way to a strong second half, which included third-place finishes in Azerbaijan and Qatar.
Those results helped Williams to fifth in the Constructors’ Championship, though Sainz finished ninth in the drivers’ standings, just behind team-mate Alex Albon.
The 2026 season brought a sharper blow. Williams produced the FW48 with a heavier chassis than its rivals, and the car started the year well behind the pace.
Sainz admitted it shook him. “Tested my faith? For sure,” he said, describing the drop from podium contention to running more than two seconds off the pace as “a big shock to the system.”
“I was the first one to say to James [Vowles, Team Principal] and to the management that it was not expected. But at the same time, we had very open and clear conversations of where things started going wrongly.”
He did not stop there. He argued the difficult start may carry some value, saying it forced changes in mentality and approach that “maybe without the bump we would have never changed.”
“Thanks to the shock of that bump, we definitely put a very strong action to correct them, to erase them from the system, to for sure try and not happen again. That made me recover a lot, that faith and the belief in the project.”
Loyalty now, with a racer’s caveat
Vowles recently signalled he wants to keep both his drivers beyond 2026.
Sainz welcomed the news. “I was delighted to hear from James that the team lineup would remain the same,” he said, calling it “the ideal path.” Staying through the rebuild is, in his view, the right thing to do.
But he left a window open. “I also know that as a driver, I like to win, and I can win both races and World Championships if I have a good car,” he said. “And if opportunities arise, then you should definitely consider them.”
Asked whether rival teams had already been in touch about 2027, he laughed and said, “Always, of course, man,” before declining to say more.
His father, double World Rally champion Carlos Sainz Sr, has backed that belief from the outside. He has said his son has the talent to reach the top but needs to be “in the right place at the right time.”
For now, that place is Williams. Albon, who recently matched Nigel Mansell’s record of 95 starts for the team, appears equally committed. Sainz, meanwhile, holds to the rebuild with one eye always on what a title-winning car would mean, wherever it comes from.
