WILLIAMS endured a frustrating start to the Formula 1 season as they left Australia without any points.

Lance Stroll finished 14th in Melbourne, with Sergey Sirotkin forced to retire on his debut for the Grove-based team.

Williams had faced a race against time to have their car ready for pre-season testing, where inclement weather in Barcelona affected their progress.

A positive practice session in Melbourne last Friday left the team encouraged, but Stroll and Sirotkin struggled in qualifying, starting 13th and 19th respectively.

The former lost places to Mercedes driver Valtteri Bottas and Force India’s Esteban Ocon early on, and he was overtaken by Sauber’s Charles Leclerc under the safety car restart.

Stroll said: “We were in the wrong mode on the first lap and that is the reason Ocon got me.

“We also have none of the extra power we need for the safety car restart, which is where I lost the place to Leclerc.

“We are just basically trying to get the car to the end of the race instead of racing.

“There was a lot going on with big issues that cost us a lot of race time. I hope we can find the solution before Bahrain.”

Sirotkin’s debut was cut short by a rear break failure on lap four.

The Russian collected a plastic bag on the circuit which blocked the brake cooling, causing the hydraulics circuit to fail.

He said: “It didn’t go as expected and I’m not even talking in terms of the results, which we obviously wanted to achieve but didn’t.

“I’m talking about the learning, which we didn’t get.

“It’s a bit of a shame and I’m quite disappointed with that because it’s not ideal.”

THE British Motocross Festival returns to Culham MX Park over the Easter weekend.

Oxfordshire riders Kristian Whatley and Luke Norris are in action in the second round of the Maxxis ACU British Motocross Championship MX1.

Local youngsters Joey Benfield and Kyron Carron compete in the Judd KTM British Youth National 65cc Championship.