F1 News: Williams Announces Delay In Bahrain Pre-Season Testing - "Changes Are Enormous"
Williams team principal James Vowles has announced that his team would arrive late for the Formula 1 pre-testing session in Bahrain, scheduled between 21 and 23 February. The announcement comes as the team adopted an entirely new approach to developing its car over the winter break by "pushing everything to the limits".
Key Takeaways:
- Williams, led by team principal James Vowles, will arrive late for Bahrain pre-testing, adopting a new strategy that pushed the 2024 car development to the limits.
- The team stands out as the only one skipping a shakedown run for the FW46, prioritizing unconventional testing methods and emphasizing changes in chassis technology.
- Vowles expresses satisfaction with the team's efforts, acknowledging the challenges of breaking technology cycles, and prioritizes virtual testing over a potentially unreliable wet shakedown run at Silverstone.
The Grove-based outfit is also the only team to postpone a shakedown run for its 2024 title contender, the FW46, as it chose to prioritize other aspects of testing over conventional methods followed by the other teams.
Vowles, who assumed the role of team principal last year, has adopted a new strategy this season. He indicates that they have maximized efforts in developing the 2024 car, a decision that brings him great satisfaction. Speaking to the media, he said:
“What we were doing with this car is pushing everything to the limits.
“And to give you ideas about that, the chassis technology is different, some of the other technologies are quite different to what we’ve done before.
“Those changes are enormous for an organisation, absolutely enormous.
“Some of those have challenged us to push ourselves beyond where we wanted to be. But in the case of what’s happened overall, I’m very, very happy.
“You simply can’t do everything at the same time, you can’t change what you’re doing and break technology cycles, and put yourself in a much better performance situation, without taking an enormous amount of risk.
“And we have, but there’s no doubt about it having the car where we have it now, and you’ll see it in Bahrain, is late.”
Skipping Silverstone
In addition, Vowles prioritized virtual testing at the factory in Grove, as opposed to a wet shakedown run at Silverstone that would have hardly fetched reliable data. He added:
“We could easily have run down there, but there was a balance between doing the virtual track test and Silverstone.
“I much rather wanted to spend the time dedicated to the virtual track test and we’ll shake it down in Bahrain.
“Silverstone, I have several feelings towards it. I’ve done it for a number of years, and sometimes you get some really good things out of it. Sometimes you’re running out on wet tyres in blustery conditions and you don’t learn a single thing.
“And that balance means I’d much rather do virtual track testing, and then bring the car to Bahrain where we can do that properly. And then furthermore, save that filming day for later in the year.
“So a bit of it is we’ve pushed ourselves to the absolute limits, a bit of it is actually I believe far more in doing other testing, if you’d like to call it that, and then use Bahrain as the opportunity to get started.”