Williams initially planned to keep Sargeant in F2 for 2023

Williams says it had initially laid out a two-year development plan for Logan Sargeant that would have kept him the young American in F2 for another season in 2023.

Instead, Sargeant's impressive performance last season with Carlin earned the young gun a promotion to F1 with Williams one year ahead of time.

Sargeant concluded the 2022 FIA Formula 2 Championship fourth in the Drivers' standings, the 22-year-old snatching two sprint race wins at Monza and at Sochi.

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Williams's top brass took note of their protégé's performances which, coupled with Nicholas Latifi's disappointing results, made a compelling case for Sargeant's graduation to F1.

"We had a two-year plan with Logan in F2, I think that’s how everybody starts," explained Williams sporting director Sven Smeets, quoted by Motorsport.com.

"When the season started, very quickly and especially at Silverstone and the races after that, we started to see the potential that we maybe didn’t have to do two seasons with him in F2.

"We didn’t say to him ‘you need to win F2 or you need to be second’, it was just his progression in F2, the raw speed he has shown in one lap, and himself maturing."

While Sargeant's speed and development argued in favor of Williams handing him a race seat, Smeets also underlined the American's overall qualities that fit the bill.

"It was also how he develops here in the sim sessions, doing his physical camps we have for them, doing the media training," added the Belgian engineer.

"All that was starting to go in a direction that, by summertime, we saw him as becoming one of our contenders."

Smeets isn't denying that Sargeant will have his work cut out for him from the outset of his rookie year in F1, and he expects mistakes to happen.

"With the tracks that are starting [the season], Saudi, not much room for error, Australia, not much room for error," said the Williams man.

"For him to learn the limits of a Formula 1 car, there are three days of testing, which are one and a half days his, and then you’re straight into a race.

"You can’t just say I’m going to do a few thousand kilometres to see how far I can go with these cars on-track. We know that will be part of that learning process.

"If the car is there where we’d like it to be, of course the first thing is challenging your team-mate, that’s number one.

"If you are in a position to fight for points, then even better. But we can’t just tell him in Bahrain, you need to beat Alex. I don’t think that would be very fair on him.

"But yeah, that’s the target: progression and to take this season to learn and then be full on for ’24."

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