Carlos Sainz “secret” Williams exit clause – Carlos Sainz was the surprise driver move of 2025 having been shown the door by Ferrari to make way for a seven times F1 champion, the Spaniard had a choice of teams at his beck and call. Red Bull Racing were said to have been interested in him as a replacement for Sergio Perez, but reports suggested that the Verstappen camp had put a stop to the matter.
Max and Carlos had raced together at Toro Rosso back in 2015 and there is said to have been tension between the fathers from both sides of the garage. Alpine too stood in line for the talented driver, but the chaos in the ever changing management structure of the team was presumably a turn off.
Sauber, soon to become Audi, were also potential brides. The link between Sainz Snr and the Audi rally team was repeatedly cited as reasons Carlos might join their F1 project. Yet Sainz Jnr rejected the two works based racing outfits to opt for Williams. Announcing the deal, Williams said he will race at the team “for ’25, ’26 and beyond”, with the deal including two guaranteed years and another option season after that.
From poles to purgatory
Whilst a period of adjustment was expected for the ex-Ferrari driver to familiarise himself with the new team and Mercedes powered car, Sainz has continued to struggle and finds himself buried down in P16 in the drivers’ title race and is facing his lowest season’s finish this year. For a man who spent four years at Ferrari battling for poles and podiums, this is unfamiliar territory.
Williams, as a team, are outperforming expectations. Alex Albon sits eighth in the standings with 77% of the team’s points. But Sainz has felt short-changed, openly critical at times of Williams’ execution on race weekends and hinting that strategy missteps and missed opportunities have masked his true performance level.
He’s shown flashes of brilliance — three sixth-place qualifying spots, five trips to Q3 — but that’s been the as good as it has got. The dream of pole battles is gone, replaced by midfield scraps and damage limitation.
Sainz ‘secret’ exit clause
When Sainz signed with Williams last year, rumours swirled about a get-out option, yet the deal presented by James Vowles was ‘long term’ and ‘multi-year.’ Auto Motor und Sport now confirm the contract contained an escape clause after just one season, designed to protect him in case Mercedes or Red Bull came calling. Whilst Mercedes are yet to re-sign their current drivers, after a failed bid to recruit Max Verstappen, Wolff is surely going to put pen to paper with Russell and Antonelli.
Red Bull will surely have a vacancy as Yuki Tsunoda is sure to end his time with the Milton Keynes based team. Yet with Horner now gone, Dr. Helmut Marko will assume responsibility for the Japanese drivers’ replacement and he will promote a Red Bull academy driver. So with no big team coming in for Carlos, he will stay put with Williams and keep faith with the James Vowles recovery projector the historic F1 team.
It’s easy to argue Sainz could have been a smarter short-term play for Mercedes than gambling everything on rookie Kimi Antonelli. Toto Wolff was in talks with the Spaniard last year but ultimately backed away, preferring Antonelli’s long-term upside.
Alpine decide. Colapinto finished
Red Bull mistake?
Ferrari, meanwhile, may already regret cutting ties with the likeable Spaniard. With Lewis Hamilton’s transition proving rockier than expected, a steady hand like Sainz could have seen Ferrari in a closer battle with runaway leaders McLaren.
Red Bull, though, might have made the biggest mistake. Max Verstappen’s camp has since reported they had no issue with Sainz joining — a surprising twist given their past friction. With Yuki Tsunoda all but out of the picture for 2026, Sainz was the most credible candidate to fill Red Bull’s second seat. Yet Milton Keynes froze and the moment was gone.
Why stay at Williams? For Sainz, the answer lies in the long game. Vowles has been selling an ambitious roadmap: steady growth, a technical overhaul in 2026, and the possibility of fighting for wins by 2028. That vision, coupled with Sainz’s faith in the project, has trumped the temptation of short-term fixes elsewhere.
Carlos Sainz has been contributing to James Vowles vision of returning Williams to the front of the grid, a rebirth of the team whose golden age was in the 1980’s and 1990’s. Drawing on his experience at Ferrari, Sainz requested the team appoint a ‘driver coach’; someone who could help him and Albon get the most out of themselves and the Williams car too.
Sainz contributes to Williams development
“This was talked about well before I arrived, well before we even did a race weekend. I just know the level that a Formula 1 team needs to operate to be an even more competitive team, like Ferrari, for example,” he told the Racer. “I just came in with a few ideas, a few things that I like, and I can cherry-pick from the four or five teams that I’ve been to in Formula 1.”
“And if I would have to create a dream team, or a dream way of how I think a team should operate and the structure that the team needs and the way we communicate as a team, I just vocalise that to James and the top-level management of the team.”
The changes Sainz has brought are clearly working with Williams noe enjoying their best season since 2017. Then it was Felpie Massa and Lance Stroll who accumulated a total of 83 points and finished fifth behind the regular front four.
So Carlos Sainz did in fact have an exit clause, but will not exercise it. Had Red Bull come calling, given the state of the team after Horner’s departure, it could well be the Spaniard would have rejected their overtures anyway.
Ferrari’s dirty secret? Hamilton fans cry “sabotage”
Lewis Hamilton’s Ferrari chapter was supposed to be the crowning glory of an already legendary career. Instead, the seven-time world champion finds himself at the centre of a storm — one fuelled by shocking online allegations that Ferrari may be favouring Charles Leclerc at Hamilton’s expense.
The whispers started in the paddock after the Hungarian Grand Prix, but social media has taken them nuclear. A mysterious TikTok account under the name olaveh7 has been drip-feeding clips, telemetry breakdowns, and cryptic voiceover commentary that claim Ferrari is undermining Hamilton through subtle but decisive setup decisions. The result? A digital firestorm with fans and pundits alike asking the unthinkable: is Hamilton being sabotaged by his own team?
The central allegation revolves around Hamilton’s car setup in Hungary. According to olaveh7, the Briton requested a rear-end stability adjustment ahead of Saturday qualifying — a tweak to give him confidence on corner entry. Engineers reportedly agreed, only for the changes to be reversed overnight by unnamed senior Ferrari engineers…. READ MORE
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