Sainz puts F1 future on hold until summer break as Williams struggles with uncompetitive car

Carlos Sainz has shelved any decision on his Formula 1 future beyond Williams until the championship’s summer break, admitting his full attention is on helping the Grove team claw back performance from a troubled start to the 2025 season.

Sainz, who joined Williams from Ferrari ahead of this year, is out of contract at the end of 2026. Despite paddock speculation that a struggling Williams could push him to look elsewhere, the Spaniard was direct when asked whether he was scouting rival seats.

“Not really,” Sainz said. “I’m not, seriously. I’m not because I have so much work to do here at Williams right now. I’ve also told my team to leave me a bit on my own until the summer break, just to try and help Williams and improve the situation as much as possible. And then in the summer break, it will be obviously time to think about it, look at the options.”

The contrast with his 2024 campaign is stark. In his first season with Williams, the four-time grand prix winner scored points in 20 races and reached the podium in both Baku and Qatar. This year, however, the team has been hampered by an overweight, uncompetitive FW48, raising questions about the direction of the project.

Sainz said the team “knows what my intentions and my priorities are” — namely to stay and support Williams’ long-term ambition of returning to race-winning form — but acknowledged there is “a lot of work” still to be done.

That work is already under way. Team principal James Vowles has outlined a rolling programme of upgrades across the coming rounds, with a “medium-sized” update due at this weekend’s British Grand Prix at Silverstone, further tweaks planned for Spa, Budapest and Zandvoort, and what Vowles described as “almost an entirely new car” set to arrive for the Baku round in September.

How much performance those updates unlock will weigh heavily on any decision Sainz makes about his future.

“I’m trying to go deep into the root of the causes together with JV and all the management,” Sainz added. “I think we’ve analysed and concluded that, but not only that — it’s what do we do moving forward, how quick are those changes going to start paying off, and how diligent and how aggressive we are in the recovery from the bump.”

With the summer break typically serving as the moment when driver market negotiations accelerate, Sainz’s timeline means Williams has a window of several races to demonstrate meaningful progress before he formally weighs his options.