Logan Sargeant: Can he stay the face of F1 in the USA?

Prospect Logan Sargeant has been on the radar since signing with Williams as a development driver.

His progress in F2 amplified the spotlight and now the rookie driver has earned his place at the top table with Williams for the 2023 season.

He will be the first American to participate in an F1 race since Alexander Rossi in 2015, and is on pace to become the first American to compete on a full F1 calendar since Scott Speed ​​in 2006. If he ever scores a win in a race, he would be the first American to do so since 1978.

But before Sargeant gets to all that, Dailymail.com takes a look at how he got here, how he ran and what Americans could expect in his first season in the big time.

Logan Sargeant was born on New Year’s Eve 2000 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. He is the younger brother of former NASCAR Truck Series driver Dalton Sargeant and nephew of energy and shipping magnate Harry Sargeant III.

In an interview published in the Formula Two websiteSargeant said that both of his parents were encouraging during his sports career, especially his father.

My parents have always been very supportive of me in racing. I feel like he has always supported me no matter the situation,” she said.

“He’s a good, intelligent man, someone to look up to, and he’s also a great father.”

Sargeant began his motorsport endeavors around the age of seven, when he began go-karting. He started in championships in the United States before crossing the pond in 2009.

In all, he has won 12 different karting titles, including the 2015 CIK-FIA World Championship. In doing this, he became the first American karting world champion since Lake Speed ​​beat a packed field, including Ayrton Senna, for the title in 1978.

Sargeant made the leap to single-seaters in the 2016-17 season in Formula Four, participating in the United Arab Emirates championship. Sargeant finished second in that series behind South African and fellow Team Motopark driver Jonathan Aberdein and ahead of future F1 driver Oscar Piastri.

For 2017, Sargeant would try his hand at the British F4 Championship, racing Carlin. He would enter a few races at Formula Renault level, but he entered 30 F4 races and took home third place in the drivers’ standings. This time, he trailed Piastri by just 19.5 points. During that time, he also captured his first F4 victories.

The following year, Sargeant dedicated his season to the Formula Renault series. Racing R-ace GP, the 21-year-old won three races and finished fourth behind Max Fewtrell, Christian Lundgaard and Ye Yifei. Once again, he finished convincingly ahead of Piastri.

In 2019 Sargeant returned to an FIA series with a return to Carlin for the Formula Three season. In a field of 34 total drivers, Sargeant finished 19th, ahead of teammate Teppei Natori, but behind teammate Felipe Drugovich.

That season also featured a podium finish at the Macau Grand Prix and he raced alongside Robert Shwartzman, Marcus Armstrong, Jehan Daruvala, Juri Vips, Christian Lundgaard, Liam Lawson and Yuki Tsunoda.

For 2020, looking for a new challenge, Sargeant switched seats and joined Prema Racing, teaming with Piastri, in Formula 3.

The season was affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, which meant the change and cancellation of races in Sochi, Bahrain and Zandvoort.

That year Piastri edged out Sargeant with the Australian finishing first and the American finishing third and Frenchman Theo Pourchaire between them. Sargeant had the same number of race wins as Piastri, taking home the silver medal at both Silverstone and Spa.

While Sargeant was expected to make the jump to F2 in 2021, he said he could not make that transition, citing financial reasons. He returned to Formula Three with Charouz Racing’s underpowered car. That season, he finished seventh. He was called up for three F2 races with HWA Racelab in Jeddah, without finishing in the points.

It was at this time that Williams Racing noticed Sargeant. They announced that the young driver would join the Williams Driver Academy at the 2021 United States Grand Prix. At the end of that year’s F1 season, he took part in post-season testing.

In 2022, he finally made the jump to Formula Two, returning to Carlin alongside Liam Lawson.

When the US F1 Grand Prix rolled around in October, Sargeant was in the top three in the F2 standings having won the feature races at Silverstone and at Red Bull Ring.

That weekend, then-Williams team boss Jost Capito announced that Sargeant would be given a ride for the team in the 2023 Formula One season on the condition that he accumulate enough super license points.

Sargeant finished the season fourth in the F2 standings (with Lawson finishing ahead of him by one point) and earned enough SL points for the seat.

It was confirmed in late November that Sargeant would race alongside Alexander Albon at Williams, racing in the No. 2, a number not seen in F1 since Stoffel Vandoorne in 2018.

So what should the Americans expect from Sargeant in their first Formula One season? It might be worth comparing him to the man he’s replacing to get a decent idea of ​​a basic expectation.

In his first full season in Formula Two (then GP2), Nicholas Latifi took just one podium finish and finished 16th out of 26 drivers. Before that, he had a season in Italian Formula Three and two full seasons of FIA Formula Three racing experience.

That’s roughly the same amount of time Sargeant had in the series before his jump to F2. But in his first full F2 season, the new Williams man scored two feature race wins, a feature race podium and a sprint race podium.

It’s hard to say whether Sargeant will immediately do better than Latifi, but it’s worth noting that Latifi’s best season in F2 was his fourth full season in that division.

It will also depend on the car Sargeant will drive, especially considering the turmoil that has gripped Williams in recent years.

Since 2020, there have been multiple changes to Williams’ ownership and development leadership following the sale of the team.

One more wrench was thrown into development when Jost Capito announced that he was stepping down as team manager.

In each of the past three seasons, Williams has finished in the bottom three in the constructors’ championship, including two seasons in which it finished last.

It is difficult to see major improvements next year, especially considering that the team has achieved eleven points and one podium in the last three seasons from a total of 61 Grands Prix.

So what’s left is how Sargeant will drive the car. Alex Albon’s car scored five podium finishes last season, including Nyck de Vries’ ninth at Monza, so if the two cars are equal, perhaps a driver like Sargeant could get him into the points.

Hoping that Sargeant breaks the rookie season record of four wins set by Lewis Hamilton with McLaren in 2007 is likely to be an exercise in fruitlessness.

For now, expect Sargeant to use this season to set a baseline for any future success.