Current Williams

Williams Grand Prix Engineering

FIA Entry: AT&T Williams
Car 11: Rubens Barrichello
Car 12: Pastor Maldonado
Engine: Cosworth V8
Team Principal: Frank Williams
Director of Engineering: Patrick Head
Technical Director: Sam Michael
Race Engineer Car 11: Tony Ross
Race Engineer Car 12: Tom McCullough

Stats as of end 2010

First Entered 1977
Races Entered 539
Race Wins 113
Pole Positions 126
Fastest Laps 130
Driver World Championships 7
Constructor World Championships 9

Team History

The Early Years

Like many team owners and principals Frank Williams started life as a driver and mechanic. Realising his ability as a driver wouldn't allow him to reach the levels he hoped Williams set up Frank Williams Racing Cars and in 1969 entered a Brabham chassis for Piers Courage. Through to 1976 Williams entered customer cars from other manufacturers before settings up Williams Grand Prix Engineering in 1977 with Patrick Head.

Williams Grand Prix Engineering

In 1977 Williams GPE entered a March 761 for Patrick Neve. In 1978 Patrick Head designed his first Williams car, the FW06, driven by Australian Alan Jones The car scored it's first points at the South African Grand Prix and Jones took Williams first podium at Long Beach, finishing 2nd behind Carlos Reutemann in a Ferrari.

In 1979 the FW07 chassis debuted and Williams had grown into a 2 car team with Clay Regazzoni joining Alan Jones. Regazzoni scored Williams first Grand Prix victory at Silverstone and Jones took another 4 victories that season. Continuing with the FW07(in A and B spec) in 1980 Jones, now partnered by Carlos Reutemann, won 6 races (5 for Jones and 1 for Reutemann) with Jones winning the drivers title and Williams the Constructors Championship.

With the FW07 in C & D spec Williams won 4 more races and again took the Constructors Championship in 1981 but missed out on the Drivers Title. Continuing with Cosworth power in 1982 Williams moved onto the FW08, a car originally designed as 6 wheeler, and Keke Rosberg joined Carlos Reutemann. Reutemann retired 2 races into the season and Mario Andretti stood in for a single race before Derek Daly permanently replaced Reutemann. Rosberg only managed a single win at the Swiss Grand Prix 1982 but it was enough for him to win the Drivers Championship.

Having driven for Frank Williams back in 1974 and 1975 Jacques Laffite partnered Keke Rosberg in 1983. Rosberg won the Monaco Grand Prix with Cosworth power and by the end of the season Williams had moved to Honda turbo power and the FW09 chassis. 1984 continued the pattern of 1 win per season for Rosberg and the Williams team with Keke taking first place in Dallas.

The Honda Era

Nigel Mansell joined Williams in 1985 and the team, still with Honda turbo engines, won 4 Grand Prix. Piquet replaced Rosberg for 1986 and between them Mansell and Piquet won 9 of the 16 races and Williams the Constructors Championship. 1987 saw another 9 victories for the team and another victory in the Constructors Championship as well as Piquet winning the Drivers Title

The departure of Honda as engine supplier and Piquet as a driver in 1989 saw Williams move temporarily to Judd engines and Mansell, now partnered by Riccardo Patrese, had a very lean season with their highest finish only 4th.

Renault Power

Williams secured Renault V10 power for 1989 and the next 9 season proved to be Williams most successful. They won 63 Grands Prix, 5 Constructors Championship (1992, 93, 94, 96 & 97) and 4 Drivers Titles (Mansell 92, Prost 93, Hill 96 and Villeneuve 97). Other winners for Williams in this period of dominance included Riccardo Patrese, Thierry Boutsen, Heinz Harald Frentzen and David Coulthard. This period was also touched by tragedy when Ayrton Senna lost his life in a Williams car at the San Marino Grand Prix at Imola in 1994

The withdrawal of Renault from F1 in 1998 moved Williams into another barren spell as the cars were powered by ageing Renault engines produced by Mecachrome (98) and Supetec (99).

BMW Williams

Williams changed to BMW V10 engines in 2000 and returned to the winners circle in 2001 with Ralf Schumacher and Juan Pablo Montoya at the wheel. The partnership with BMW continued until 2006 with Williams winning 10 Grands Prix and were runners up in the Constructors Championship in 2002 and 2003. Ralph Schumacher drove for Williams for 6 season and was partnered by Alex Zanardi, Jenson Button (debuting in F1 in 2000) and Montoya with Mark Gene and Antonio Pizzonia making occasional appearances as stand in drivers. BMW's final season with Williams saw Mark Webber and Nick Heidfeld taking podiums but able to not challenge for wins.

Toyota Customer

A season of Cosworth power in 2006, with Mark Webber joined by F1 new boy Nico Rosberg, proved very unsuccessful and in 2007 Williams became customers of Toyota. As one of the few truly independent teams still competing in F1 Williams struggled to compete with the factory supported teams and were probably best categorised as "the best of the rest". Webber left at the end of 2007 and Rosberg, initially partnered by Alex Wurz and then by Toyota "works" driver Kazuki Nakajima, managed a highest finish of 2nd in Singapore 2008 with Williams finishing 4th, 8th and 7th in the Constructors Championship whilst using Toyota power.

In 2009 Williams sold a minority share in the company to an Austrian investment company led by Toto Wolff.

Williams Cosworth

In 2010 Williams returned to Cosworth engines and signed up Rubens Barrichello and Nico Hulkenberg to drive for them. Hulkenberg took a surprising pole in changeable weather conditions in Brazil to give Williams their first such grid position since Nick Heidfeld in 2005. Although regular points finishers Williams weren't challenging for wins and finished the season 6th in Constructors Championship.

2011 sees Rubens Barrichello retain his seat at Williams with GP2 Champion Pastor Maldonado alongside him. They will continue with Cosworth engine power.
 
Did I miss the joke as well?

As an aside, Frank Williams has always had a rule that he doesn't steal sponsors from other teams and if you look at the teams sponsors over the years this is clear. His ambition has always been to bring new companies into the sport. What that hasn't stopped is other teams stealing Williams sponsors.

If others in F1 had the personal morals and standards of Sir Frank the sport would be in a much better place.
 
I thought I heard Claire Williams say putting Williams presents" a great opportunity " - she is right on that part which is to hopefully have a competent Team Principal replacing her
 
I would almost go to as far to say that Mercedes engine might be 1 of worst things to happen to them last 10 yrs. because it have them a false sense of success & if they had any other engine they would've found out maybe 3 years earlier how bad there aero chassis was but having the brilliant results on the power circuits Austria, Britain, Germany, Beligium papered over the cracks. didn't see qualifying 13th & 16th at Monaco or 1.2 secs of Mercedes at spain was sign of things to come & it wasn't until the Mercedes engine had more parity with the others they'd realised but by then the damage had been done & so many years behind now
 
Well also it's meant they are not allowed to win races. Remember when they were 1-2 in front of the mercs and mysteriously they both pitted completely off preferred strategy and magically the Merc's got past them?
 
yeah i would hope that was stategical incompetence because otherwise toto wolff will get thrown out of the sport for race fixing in the same way as briatore did. but i remember that they shouldve won British GP. why they didnt let bottas through when he clearly miles quicker than massa i dont know. Austria i think mercedes just had far better race pace
 
Lol. No he wouldn't it happens all the time. Every time a Toro Rosso moves over for a Red Bull, every time a Haas makes it 'easy' for a Ferrari to get past. Not a chance they would ever get done for race fixing. Did Ron Dennis and Frank Williams get done for race fixing when it was agreed for Vilneurve to pull over to let the McLaren's through to win? No!
 
Lol. No he wouldn't it happens all the time. Every time a Toro Rosso moves over for a Red Bull, every time a Haas makes it 'easy' for a Ferrari to get past. Not a chance they would ever get done for race fixing. Did Ron Dennis and Frank Williams get done for race fixing when it was agreed for Vilneurve to pull over to let the McLaren's through to win? No!

I remember reading the stories that It was heavily investigated & was in front of the FIA world council as they got tapes of the team radio

 
It couldn't have been investigated very hard as the two were seen having the conversation in the pit lane, we were all aware what was happening on the day as it happened and everyone involved has said thats what happened.

McLaren still lie about the David Coulthard one in Australia the following year but not that one.
 
Okay list of top 10 things Williams have got wrong in the last 10 years to decline
1. Appoint Claire Williams - I think she took the opportunity when it was there to do it rather than being selected

2. Hire Lance Stroll because his Dad was throwing money into the team so they went from 5th to 10th as a constructor after they decided to seek their fortunes elsewhere

3. Hire Pastor and his dodgy Venezuelan cash - strangely will be remembered as the last driver to win for Williams possibly but also junked a lot chassis in 2012 and 2013 was simply awful

4.Sack Hulkenberg - who knows what he might have done in 2012 with that car

5. Merc engines - got the bum end of the deal firstly Mercedes poaching both Toto and Paddy Lowe from them and probably not got a decent return for allowing Bottas to go

6. Failing to re-sign Button in 2016/ 17 because they were not as competitive but they finished ahead of Mclaren in the constructors that year. Had he gone to Williams he would have been no doubt No 1 rather than No 2 at Mclaren and Alonso

7. Rehiring Massa for 2017 - he retired because clearly he was past it so recalling him for one more season was not forward thinking

8. Sacking Paddy Lowe/ Mike Coughlan - it is easy to point the figure at them when clearly the problems at Williams runs deeper than the car

9. Using Cosworth engines in 2010 and 2011- yes they were cheaper but there was talk they were speaking to both Merc and Renault about engines - the latter were a better partner possibly

10 Hiring and firing Bruno Senna - Its almost as soon as he jumped into a Williams his seat was under pressure from the beginning . Williams cashed on their 5 minute of nostalga - Senna and Williams - Renault but Bruno got treated badly
 
I'm sure owning shares in 3 teams on the grid and a company that managers drivers is not a conflict of interest in the slightest.

Only sport in the world which does not have rules against this sort of thing.
 
RasputinLives I do remember how Flavio tried to control half the grid back in the early 00's with his drivers

I think Moto Gp runs a very close thing because it seems if you are not Spanish you pretty much have no chance of getting a factory bike .

FB Why am I not surprised that Williams could be seen as a permanent Mercedes Jnr team and they could swap with their drivers from the Formula E team as well

Any chance he will give Susie a drive then in one of the seats ?
 
It would make a lot of sense for Mercedes to take over Williams as a B team they already have the engine deal. They are the only top constructor without a B team. Ferrari have Alfa and Redbull have Torro Rosso. It makes sense and would save Williams in the interim until the cost cap comes in. I would also be tempted to give George Russell and Bottas a seat swap.
 
I do remember back in the 70s and 80s when the manufacturers went against the privateers. The problem is the money distribution has gone so much in favour of the manufacturers so the only way to equalise the field will be budget restriction but then again the way the money is being paid out that needs to be sorted. Hwa will problem appear given they are not going to do DTM next year and probably also in being William's it would stop Audi or even BMW consider buying the team
 
The new Williams breaks cover

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Think I prefer this to the toothpaste colour scheme, even if there are fewer sponsors. Just needs some British racing green in the mix somewhere.
 
What happened to the traditional Williams colours ?
Anyone know who the owners of the sponsors are?

I am reading Merc are discussing sponsorship with I think Rokit
 
Il_leone i think most of them sponsors come from latifi.

Titch if Williams aren't British then. nobody stands a chance. but it weird that alot like ferrari being red because of Marlboro. Williams seem to be blue & white well after rothmans have disappeared nearly 25yrs ago now
 
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