Singing Sainz celebrates ‘life lesson’ with landmark Baku podium

Spaniard Carlos Sainz said his third-place finish and first podium since joining Williams had given him a “life lesson” as he celebrated “the best result of my career” with a song at Sunday’s Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

On the team radio during his slow-down lap he sang “This is my first ‘smooth operation’ for Williams,” a reference to the 1984 classic “smooth operator” sung by Sade, and which was given to him as a nick-name by former team-mates.

A four-time race winner with former team Ferrari, Sainz scored Williams’ first podium of the year and first –- in a full race — since Lance Stroll finished third at the same event in 2017.

“I am extremely proud of everyone at Williams for pushing through a very difficult year,” said Sainz.

“We have proved to everyone that we have taken a massive step compared to last year.

“We are on the rise and going in the right direction, but unfortunately, with me, we have had a lot of bad luck and incidents.”

Sainz’s success made him the second F1 driver after four-time champion Alain Prost to finish on the podium for McLaren, Ferrari and Williams and lifted him six positions to 12th in the drivers’ title race. 

Williams’ last ‘short race’ podium came at the rain-hit one-lap 2021 Belgian Grand Prix, which was run behind a safety car and where George Russell was classified as second. 

“This tastes much better than any other thing I was expecting,” said Sainz.

“It’s a life lesson to keep believing and trusting yourself and your team around you, because sooner or later it always pays off.” 

Having started second after a perfectly-judged use of tyres in Saturday’s chaotic rain-affected qualifying, Sainz measured his Sunday drive to equal perfection.

“We have been fighting hard all year and we proved, when we had the speed… and everything comes together, we can do some amazing things.

“We nailed the race. Not one mistake and we managed to beat a lot of cars yesterday that we wouldn’t have expected to beat.”