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Williams F1 chassis in Baku practice drain crash repaired for Spain

The Williams Formula 1 chassis damaged when George Russell hit a loose manhole cover in Azerbaijan has been repaired and is available for this weekend's Spanish Grand Prix.

Williams was not able to undertake repairs on the spot in Baku, which is why Russell had to switch to the spare chassis and missed the rest of Friday practice.

But the damaged chassis is now back in use, along with the one that team-mate Robert Kubica crashed in qualifying and was repaired for the race but required some further work.

"Both chassis have been repaired from both incidents over the Baku weekend, and both are here, as is the spare chassis as well," said deputy team principal Claire Williams when asked about the situation by Autosport.

"The guys have done a phenomenal job at the factory getting them into the system and then all repaired to have them all here."

The Baku organisers have agreed to pay compensation for the damage caused to Russell's car, following the precedent set when Haas received a payment after Romain Grosjean hit a drain cover in Malaysia in 2017.

"I'm really pleased," said Williams. "I met with the promoter when we were in Baku to have the conversation, and obviously explained that to have it expedited was important to us.

"They've been very accommodating, and they seem to be moving things pretty quickly forwards.

"It will got through the [circuit's] insurance company. I don't know how long it will take, but they understand that it needs to move sooner rather than later.

"So we're just in the process now of working out the cost of it to us, and we'll file that, and then go from there."

Williams acknowledged that it is not easy for an F1 team to put a monetary value on accident damage.

"That's why we're still going through that process at the moment," she said.

"Obviously our priority was to get the repair work done, and then we'll go through the analysis to understand exactly how much of a cost there is."

Zdroj: autosport.com