MONTMELO, Spain -- Robert Kubica says he willingly gave up his final pre-season test appearance to Williams race driver Lane Stroll in order to strengthen the team's Australian Grand Prix chances.
Kubica, Williams' reserve driver, was slated to take over from Russian rookie Sergey Sirotkin on Friday afternoon. However, that plan was confirmed to have changed in the morning, with Sirotkin's teammate Stroll given a final afternoon in the car before the opening race at Melbourne.
Teams lost a significant chunk of running to adverse weather conditions last week and Williams is one of only two teams to have given up track time to a non-race driver -- Force India ran Nikita Mazepin during the first test.