An honest look at F1 driver Logan Sargeant

As the only driver on the grid from the United States, a lot of hope, as well as a lot of pressure has been pinned on Logan Sargeant, the 22-year-old from Florida. Now that there are three races in the US, along with a new and growing fan base, a fan base that F1 has sought after for decades, it is all too clear that the elephant in the room is that there are very few Americans actually competing in Formula One. One of the reasons for that seems to be that most Americans are partial to IndyCar racing, or even NASCAR. It’s an easier path to follow if you are from North America. For a driver to make it to Formula One they have to move to Europe at some point early in their careers. Some, like Logan Sargeant, did it at the age of twelve, while he was still karting, eventually winning the Karting World Championship there.

After that, Sargeant went into single seaters, and worked his way up to Formula 3, but the money was running out. In 2020, he went into the final race of the season tied with Oscar Piastri in points, but it was a day to forget for Sargeant, and he ended up finishing the season in third. Mercedes had been taking a look at him and passed, so it was looking like it might be the end of the road in terms of finding a seat in F1. Sargeant did have prospects in IndyCar and other series, so he took some time after the Formula 3 season to collect himself and contemplate his next move. That’s when Williams asked him to join their Junior Driver Program.

It was a shot in the arm. Sargeant did another season in Formula 3 and moved on to Formula 2, where he finished fourth in 2022, becoming the first driver from the United States to win a Formula 2 feature race when he won at Silverstone. He even went on to win at the Red Bull Ring a few weeks later, proving that he had the goods to compete. Williams’ plan was for Sargeant was for him to spend another season in F2 to get more experience and add points to his FIA Super License (which is required to compete in FIA events such as F1), but the world of F1 had other plans.

Originally, Williams thought they would be getting Oscar Piastri on loan from Alpine to replace Nicholas Latifi for the 2023 F1 season, but Piastri went to McLaren. Next on the list was Nyck de Vries, who came with a lot of experience in other racing categories, but Nyck chose Alpha Tauri. With Williams still needing to fill their open seat, they decided to fast-track Sargeant and give him the shot he deserved. Unfortunately for de Vries, his own F1 career was cut short after being replaced by Daniel Ricciardo for the remainder of the 2023 season, due to his lack of performance. Sargeant has managed to keep his seat for the remainder of 2023, but he is still fighting for a seat in 2024.

Prior to the United States GP, Sargeant had not scored any F1 points, although he had come close, finishing 11th at Silverstone earlier in the year. In the first half of the season Sargeant continued to show signs of improvement, even though he was racing on a lot of tracks he’d never been to before, and a lot of those tracks were street tracks with little room for error. He paid the price a few times, but nevertheless had stayed within a reasonable distance to his teammate Alex Albon, who is an exceptionally talented driver. After the summer break, Sargeant expected to come back rested and ready to compete on tracks that are more familiar to him, and when asked if the time off would slow the momentum he’d been building, he said not at all.

After the summer break, at the Dutch GP, Sargeant started out by making it into Q3 for the first time in his F1 career. He was a superstar for about ten minutes, before he crashed on his out lap at the beginning of the session. He went on to crash out of the race on lap 14, while his teammate, Albon, finished 8th. The disappointment hit him hard and his critics only became more vocal. German pundit and former driver, Ralph Schumacher, called out for him to be replaced by his nephew, Ralph, while others questioned whether Sargeant had enough talent to compete. The second half of the season was not starting out as planned, and although Williams’ team principal, James Vowles, continued to back Sargeant, it was beginning to look like the pressure to perform might be too great. In the next four races, Sargeant went on a run of bad luck and mental errors. He was beginning to self destruct.

At the United States GP in Austin, however, Logan Sargeant finished just behind his more experienced teammate, Albon, and when Hamilton and Leclerc were disqualified, his 12th place finish became a 10th place finish. Yes, Sargeant got lucky, but a lot of racing is luck. The single point he scored on Sunday makes Sargeant the first American driver to score in F1 since Mario Andretti in 1993. It has been thirty years. What better way to give your confidence a boost than to score your first points in front of a home crowd!

There’s no doubt that all eyes will be on Sargeant for the final four races of the season as he looks to make his case for being re-signed in 2024. There are a lot of people in the United States who would love to see their country well represented in a sport where they are underrepresented, and there are those who want to see the American fail for their own personal reasons. After all, there are only twenty drivers in F1 and they can’t all win. These last few races are going to be critical for Sargeant to make a good impression. If he can finish on a strong note and continue to improve, he should have a bright future in F1, or at least get another year to hone his talent. He’s got the goods, he just needs the experience. Let’s hope he gets it.