As the Williams racing prepares for the launch of their 2021 challenger the FW43B one person who is looking forward to the season ahead is Williams driver Nicholas Latifi. After his rookie season in 2020 the Canadian is hoping to see his track performances improve, especially compared to his more highly rated team-mate George Russell.

Coming off a season that saw his performances somewhat hidden by those of George but despite this he still feels that his strong race performances were let down by his poor performances in qualifying. Nicholas would find himself out qualified by his teammate at Williams. But despite this Nicholas would achieve three 11th place finishes in his rookie season despite successfully making it into Q2 only once across the season.

In an interview for GPFans Global Nicholas spoke of his views in regard to his performances compared to George.

Nicholas said: "I think naturally, that kind of understanding about what I need to do in the races is a stronger area for me."

"Not to say that is a weakness of George's. George is obviously just exceptionally strong on a Saturday where in general I feel I hadn't extracted the most out of the car but more specifically, myself in a lot of the qualifying, I hadn't finished and been like oh, where do I find this time.

"Most of the time, I finished a lap and was like 'oh, I could have matched that time and I made a mistake in that corner or my out lap wasn't perfect and my brakes weren't in the window'."

So despite his lack of qualifying pace Nicholas still is of the view that he was doing things right on race day.

"There have always been some things where we were trying to put things together which is obviously very difficult in any category, specifically F1. I think George was exceptionally good at doing that.

"What is he now, 'Mr Saturday' or something? But I think that highlights the fact that I am relatively closer to the performance in races that the tyre management, the old strength of mine in F2 is clearly there still.

"But I definitely need to improve Saturday's because having that starting position would make such a big difference in the race."

As for what makes his team-mate so strong Nicholas in an interview with GPFans.com added: "I think what gets noticed the most, not only from drivers but from the general public, is the Saturday [performance]."

"Obviously, so much emphasis is on the qualifying because it is kind of showing your potential, showing your speed.

"The fact that he is exceptionally good on Saturdays, putting laps together, gets close to the maximum from the car consistently because he very rarely has things go wrong, whether that is from a mistake in the lap or a mistake in the preparation or what have you.

"It is just always being put together. I think that is what gets noticed the most and obviously, being his teammate, seeing his data and the consistency of that, it is one of his strong points.

"Probably, from my experience with other teammates, he is probably one of the best on a Saturday that I have raced against. So that is obviously a really big part of what being a racing driver is."

In the teams pre-season filimg day shakedown Nicholas and George would complete their first drive of the 2021 Williams, the FW43B. The next event for the team is the official launch on March 5, then it is off to a brief three day test at Barain prior to the first race of the season where we will see whether of not Nicholas can close the gap to his team-mate.