Victor Martins splits 2026: Alpine Hypercar drive, Williams test role
Victor Martins is doubling down for 2026, and doing it with a foot in both worlds. The 24-year-old Frenchman will race for Alpine in the World Endurance Championship’s Hypercar class while stepping up to a Test and Development Driver role with Williams in Formula 1.
It’s a neat circle for Martins. He grew up in Alpine’s junior stable, switched to Williams’ programme for 2025 and made an assured FP1 debut in Barcelona last season. Now he returns to the Alpine camp for a full-time tilt at WEC, replacing part of a line-up reshuffle there, while Williams formalises him as a key piece of its development core.
For Williams, the timing is tidy. With Alex Albon and Carlos Sainz fronting the team in 2025, the Grove outfit gets another sharp set of hands to feed the simulator and TPC work as the 2026 regulations roll in. Martins has already spent weekends in the garage with the race team and sampled Williams machinery in anger at the Spanish Grand Prix. That context matters when you’re trying to translate sim deltas into lap time.
“Williams is an iconic team with an incredible history and I’m excited to be part of the project to bring this team back to the front of the grid,” Martins said. “I’ve already had experience working with Alex and Carlos during race weekends, and I’m looking forward to continuing this work with the team in 2026. Thanks to James Vowles, Sven and everyone at Williams for the opportunity.”
Sporting director Sven Smeets, never one to oversell, didn’t hold back. He hailed Martins’ feedback as “invaluable” through 2025, pointing to the Frenchman’s FP1 mileage in Barcelona and his graft in the Testing of Previous Cars programme as the right real-world grounding for developing Williams’ FW48 and beyond.
The WEC side is where Martins gets to race, and race often. He’ll climb aboard the Alpine A424 Hypercar, targeting a debut at the Qatar 1812km in late March and, crucially for any French racer, a first crack at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. He’s called that opportunity a huge motivation, and it also confirms his exit from Formula 2 after three seasons.
It’s also a sensible career play. As a former Formula 3 champion with proven one-lap speed, Martins keeps one foot firmly in single-seaters without sitting idle on Sundays. Endurance racing isn’t a soft option anymore; the Hypercar field is stacked, the traffic management is brutal, and the technical crossover with F1’s energy management and hybrid systems is only getting stronger. For Alpine’s programme, which reshapes its roster for 2026, Martins brings the right blend of youth, pace and discipline from his academy years.
From Williams’ side, this is exactly the kind of joined-up thinking that’s characterised the Vowles era. Bank a driver who’s plugged into the simulator, has fresh references from FP1, and can slot into development work while racing at a high level elsewhere. It keeps the pipeline warm without clogging their race seats, and it gives Albon and Sainz another steady voice in the loop when correlation questions inevitably pop up around the 2026 cars.
Martins will officially graduate out of Williams’ junior ranks as he takes on the test role, moving into the pro-driver column with responsibilities across both programmes. Expect him to be a familiar face at Grove on non-WEC weeks, living in the sim and feeding setup direction, tyre models and aero maps back into the FW48 project.
As for the big-ticket item: Le Mans. Alpine will want fireworks on home soil, and Martins knows this is the one that moves the needle. If he adapts quickly to stint management and traffic, his qualifying punch from the junior formulas should serve Alpine well in the Hyperpole fight.
All in, it’s a well-timed pivot. Martins gets a marquee seat, more racing, and a bigger voice at an F1 team chasing its next step. Williams gets a driver it trusts in the loop for 2026. Alpine gets a hungry Frenchman back under its banner for a renewed Hypercar push. No downside in sight.
