EXCLUSIVE: Jacques Villeneuve Discusses Williams' Lap of Legends, Andretti's F1 Bid, Adrian Newey, And More

Lydia Mee | Apr 11, 2024

Feb 16, 2022; Daytona, FL, USA; Feb 16, 2022; Daytona, FL, USA; NASCAR Cup Series driver Jacques / Mike Dinovo-USA TODAY Sports

In this exclusive interview with Sports Illustrated’s Lydia Mee, Jacques Villeneuve discusses Williams’ latest collaboration with Michelob ULTRA, the ‘Lap of Legends'. The 1997 F1 champion delves into the illustrious history of the British racing team, the importance of maintaining the team's rich history while navigating the modern era of the sport, sim racing, and the challenges new manufacturers face entering the F1 arena.

Michelob ULTRA has teamed up with Williams to introduce an unprecedented experience – a real vs. virtual race titled "Lap of Legends." This innovative event aims to celebrate the illustrious history of Williams Racing and its legendary drivers, bridging the gap between different eras of Formula 1. The race features Logan Sargeant competing against virtual versions of iconic Williams Racing champions like Mario Andretti, Nigel Mansell, Alain Prost, and Villeneuve.

The "Lap of Legends" is made possible through cutting-edge technology, including artificial intelligence and augmented reality, to create virtual avatars of the F1 legends that replicate their racing styles and strategies with remarkable accuracy. The event is co-hosted by Jenson Button and Naomi Schiff.

Lydia Mee: Lap of Legends celebrates the history of Williams Racing - teams are constantly changing in F1. We’ve seen legendary constructors like Sauber rename to Stake and now sell to Audi, Renault is now Alpine, Minardi is RB. Being the last driver to win a championship with the team, how important is it to Williams to retain its strong history, and how should James Vowles go about shaping its future?

Jacques Villeneuve: “It's super important. It's a team with so much history and I'm very proud to be part of it.

“You can't forget your roots. That's the danger, when a sport becomes as big as F1 is now, and mediatized, to forget the roots, to forget who you are. Why is it there what it's all about? And so you need teams like Williams to retain that. As long as they're doing it seriously, professionally, going in the right direction, and not just staying in there because they can make a buck.” 

LM: This TV special is all about real vs virtual. In 1996 you were using sim racing to train yourself for your F1 debut, do you think you were the first to do this, and did you have any idea it would become such a huge part of training and development for modern teams?

JV: “Yeah, it's called sim racing, but it's a game basically and I was a gamer. It's very simple. I grew up being a gamer and always playing racing games even on the old consoles where they weren't really close to any simulation. And just when I got into F1 there was Grand Prix, and it was quite a good sim. I used it, not a lot, just to learn some tracks, like Spa, that were complex and we couldn't test there. So I would do six laps on the video game just to get the basic idea of when there's a left or right corner coming. 

“But that's it, not anymore, not to get into bad habits because there's a separation. So it was just to get an idea. ‘Okay, after the hill, there will be a corner to the right’. So I'm not surprised I'll be on the correct side of the track. So that saved a little bit of memory time in learning the track.

“That was the main reason, but mainly because I just love playing games.”

'Lap of Legends' - Williams Racing - Michelob ULTRA / Williams Racing - Michelob ULTRA

LM: Do you still do any sim racing in your spare time?

JV: “No, I haven't had the time lately, you know, six kids, and then two little babies. That really takes the time away.

“I used to be on rFactor. I was running my own league and James Vowles actually was racing in my league with Anthony Davidson. I would also program the cars and the tracks because I like programming a bit. So it would be up all week and you could qualify all week. The server was always on. And they were good, James and Anthony, they would start doing the engineering work together and they were tough to beat. Even though I was programming the tracks and the cars, they were still tough to beat.”  

LM: Max Verstappen is known for sim racing, do you think this helps him become a better driver in F1?

JV: “It helps the focus, because when you're in a real car, it's easy to be focused. It's happening physically. You don't have a choice. 

“When you're in front of a computer, it's so easy to just wonder somewhere else and think about something else. So on that aspect, yes. The driving, no. There's a slight difference and you really have to separate the two. Just because you're good on the sim [you can’t] suddenly [go], okay, you'll drive in a Formula One car.

“You'll get some bad habits and the two are not a hundred percent close.”

Lap of Legends - Williams Racing - Michelob ULTRA / Williams Racing - Michelob ULTRA

LM: I wanted to talk about your time working with Adrian Newey. He’s done an incredible job on the RB19 and 20 and I know he designed your title-winning car for Williams. Can you give us some insight into what it is like working with Newey? Is there anything he does that separates him from the other technical personnel you have worked with?

JV: “I didn't know at the time when I joined in ‘96. I realized afterwards. He was amazing because I guess he can visualize the car, he can see it, he can see the airflow. And he relates to it but he also relates to the driver. He knows it's not a computer driving. He knows it's not a robot. So even if on the data, the numbers say this is how quick it could be, maybe a driver cannot drive it. It doesn't feel natural. 

“And he's able to accept that and work around and work with a driver. And that’s why he's made so many amazing cars. He is definitely the best out there and he has always been able to reinvent himself. 

“We saw that because he designed a ‘97 car based on ‘96 and by the end [it was] based on what I was feeding him because I was going to be the driver of the following year. But then he left and we felt it because halfway through the season, we were nowhere. It took a while for the new people involved to get the ball rolling again. It's hard to beat that combination of Adrian Newey. 

“But right now where the team is at with the technology level, the engineers, they’ve James Vowles also running a team. They’re going in the right direction. 

“That's why it was fun to do the Lap of Legends because you can get into the new technology and to relive a moment with all the guys I've raced against. That was the first time I raced Logan [Sargeant], actually. But, it's as if there was a big hiatus from the late nineties until two or three years ago with the team now finally rebuilding.

“It was really nice Michelob ULTRA set that up, because I think it can really help to get closer to the newer fans. It's a little bit harder for us because I've seen racing since the '70s with my dad when he was racing against Mario [Andretti]. Then I raced Mario in IndyCar, which was amazing. I raced Nigel [Mansell] there as well. And I've seen all the different evolutions, all the different eras of racing and Formula One, but none of us could imagine an AI day.”

LM: The idea of comparing F1 legends from different eras of the sport has always been a big discussion point. With constant changes in regulations, scoring and longer seasons, do you think it’s fair to directly compare current drivers to the previous legends? 

JV: “You can't because a driver drove according to his era, like take Mario [Andretti] driving in the '80s, it's a car that would break down one race in two, so you just didn't drive aggressively, you had to massage your car. Take a modern car like today, the cars are stuck to the ground, you just have to muscle through them and they never break, so the driving is a little bit different.

“So if you take Logan [Sargeant] and put him in a car from the '80s, he would drive differently than he's driving now. And if you take Mario from then and put him in today's car, he drives differently as well. So that's why a full realistic comparison is very difficult.”

Feb 16, 2022; Daytona, FL, USA; NASCAR Cup Series driver Jacques Villeneuve (27) during qualifying / Mike Dinovo-USA TODAY Sports

LM: You obviously love your Audis, I love the custom bright pink RS6, are you excited for Audi to join the grid and what do you think their immediate challenges are going to be?

JV: “Well, they're joining with a team that hasn't been any good for so many years. And, you just can't invent know-how. It's something that you build over time. You can see it with Williams. You know, they stay kind of good for a while, but you pay the price of pay drivers, of all that, you pay it late. And now the team has been rebuilding, but it doesn't happen overnight. It also takes time. So, it won't happen overnight. 

“And then how are they joining? Are they joining the same way Renault Alpine joined just to be part of F1 and make some image or to actually be racers and try and go out and win, that we don't know.

“What's dangerous with constructors when they come in is they can easily in five minutes decide, ‘okay, we're gone, bye’ and they leave and they don't care. They're great for the sport, but they're also very dangerous in that respect. Where a team like Williams cannot leave. It exists with and because of F1. What does Williams do if they stop F1? Nothing. 

“So, you're kind of secure in the knowledge that they will find a way to persevere to get better and because it's their bread and butter.”  

LM: Speaking of new manufacturers coming into the sport, do you think Formula One made the right decision in rejecting Andretti’s bid for now?

JV: “It depends. As a fan, you would want them in. But all we can say is that they [FOM] had information we didn't have on how the team was going to be built. We don't know. We only know what we see in the media and what we see in the media today is very dangerous because anyone with an account online can be a journalist and say whatever and suddenly, it's true. 

“So it's very difficult to start making judgments based on that, we don't have all the info. But obviously it's a big racing company, they have cars everywhere, they have big money behind them. Does that make them a potential winning team in F1? No. A potential, yes, but who knows.

“A lot of people have tried and broken their teeth. I built a team with Craig Polo, BAR, which today has become Mercedes. It's not easy. It really is not easy even with the right people on board. So obviously they had some knowledge that we didn't, if not, they would have been in.”

May 25, 2014; Indianapolis, IN, USA; IndyCar Series driver Jacques Villeneuve during the 2014 / Andrew Weber-USA TODAY Sports

LM: I know you started Feed Racing in 2019 to help young aspiring drivers reach F4, do you think enough is done to support the younger generation and do you think the F1 Academy will become more successful with its closer collaboration with F1?

JV: “Nothing is done, nothing is done for the younger generation, nothing at all. 

“They want the image of being perceived as helping, but they're not. The only team I've seen doing that has been Williams with Logan [Sargeant]. Williams financed his Formula Two season and the caveat was if you get your super license points, then you'll be an F1. So there was a proper, ‘you get the result you're in’.

“I haven't seen any other team doing that. So no, they're not being helped. They're helped after the parents have already spent a few millions to get them through karting, you know, half a million a season of karting, which is ridiculous and so on.

“We just tried to recreate what used to exist in the '70s and the '80s, Alain Prost got to through F1 like this, [Olivier] Panis as well. But there's only so much we can do because it's all self-financed. Basically, they do the course, they have to spend a little bit of money. Obviously it's all based on the clock, and the winner gets a free season in Formula 4. But financially, we cannot then follow to the next step for this.

“A linked team like Williams would be amazing, but then it's really purely based on results. You don't always get the winner you want, but you go with the result, you put them under pressure and F1 is also, it's not just being the quickest, it's how you perform under pressure.”