Sky Sports F1 2012 – 18 Abu Dhabi GP – Race: Williams F1 Team

Williams Online video Score: 5 / 5

FRUSTRATED AT FORM

Williams F1 driver Valtteri Bottas has said that he is extremely frustrated with the form of his team in the early part of the campaign. Williams are confident that they had made great progress from the 2012 car, which struggled for most of the season. The results from the Spanish Grand Prix proved to back this claim, as Williams was extremely quick in the race. However, the results have tailed off in recent races after both Williams drivers were unable to finish in the points scoring position at the Malaysian Grand Prix and the Australian Grand Prix.

Apart from the lack of space, Williams have also suffered from reliability issues as well. Bottas has said that he expects Williams to start challenging for a points scoring position in forthcoming races. This is because the current car is better than the 2012 car in several aspects. He expects the results to improve once the team has a better understanding of the car as the season progresses. He says that there is a lot of potential in the FW35 that he expects results to improve sooner rather than later. The best place achieved by Valtteri Bottas this season was the 11th place finish at the Malaysian Grand Prix.

“Of course I was hoping to fight for better positions. The goal is to get higher and be consistently in the points. It’s what the team was hoping for and what I’m hoping for so of course it’s a bit disappointing. It is how it is now, we just need to get back there. We’re understanding more all the time. We need more time but we will get there. It’s a different car, [and] some things were better in the [2012] car. The goal for this year is to improve the position from last year so we need to get working,” said Bottas.

Megafactories Williams F1 – Part 3

Williams Movie Ranking: five / five

WILLIAMS CONFIDENT

The Williams F1 driver Pastor Maldonado has said that he is confident that the team has managed to put together a good package this season. Williams suffered from poor form at the opening Australian Grand Prix, but Maldonado is confident that the team will be able to recover from this setback and do well at the Malaysian Grand Prix next weekend. Even though Williams were extremely promising during the winter testing, they looked extremely off the pace in the race. As a result, they were predominantly in the back of the grid.

Maldonado said that his car was on the brink of being undriveable, while his teammate Valtteri Bottas finished only in the 14th position. However, the Venezuelan has said that most of the issues faced by Williams right now is due to the fact that they have essentially modified the 2012 version of their car. He expects the problems to reduce in the forthcoming races, as they get to grips with this new car. Williams introduced a number of upgrades during the winter testing, but most of them were removed at the Australian Grand Prix. Essentially, Maldonado was racing with a car that was similar to the one that was launched.

“It will be short-term, I think and hope. It’s nothing in the design of the car. I think we have great potential. The heart of the car is last year’s car. We just need to work at it and see what we can do in time.” Now we think we see where the problems are and we think we have a solution. But we have different solutions to test tomorrow with both cars and then we will see if we were right or not,” said the 28-year-old. Rain is also expected at the Malaysian Grand Prix to make things worse for Williams.

Innovation in Motor Sport: Patrick Head, Williams F1 /Williams Hybrid, Future Transport 16 Aug 2012

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Spa Onboard

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WILLIAMS NOT LOOKING

Williams have denied speculation that they are currently looking for a replacement for the former chief operations engineer, Mark Gillan. Gillan has been widely credited with the Williams team rediscovering their form last season. However, he left the team during the final few months of the campaign. The position has been vacant since then, but there have been rumours that the team will be looking to appoint a successor ahead of the 2013 season. This has been ruled out by the Williams chief designer Mike Coughlan. He has stated that people should not forget that there are a lot of changes happening within F1 with several people moving on in their careers.

The departure of Gillan is one such incident, and the team does not plan to replace his position with a newcomer. Coughlan has said that people should be viewing it as the opportunity opened for members within the current staff, who could be promoted to this position. The young people within the Williams F1 team might be offered this opportunity. Even though the team will be sacrificing some of the experience they would get from hiring an engineer like Gillan, Coughlan has stated that the dedication from the young people will be able to overcome it.

“You have to remember, there’s a lot of people moving forward in their careers. We look at it as one door closing, another door opening, and a tremendous opportunity for some young people. What you may lose in experience, you certainly make up for in dedication,” said Coughlan in a recent interview. He once again confirmed during the final stages of the interview that the team does not have any immediate plans of replacing the former chief operations engineer. It is expected that Williams will not be replacing him even on a short-term basis.