Williams F1 Chief Confirms Significant Post-Summer Break Upgrades

Williams F1 chief confirms significant post-summer break upgrades.

Oct 23, 2022; Austin, Texas, USA; The crew of Williams Racing driver Nicholas Latifi (6) of Team Canada wheel their car onto the grid before the start of the U.S. Grand Prix F1 race at Circuit of the Americas. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports / Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports

In light of a struggling 2024 season marked by underperformance with their FW46 car model, the Williams F1 team is poised to introduce a series of critical upgrades after the current summer break.

Williams team chief James Vowles has revealed that significant updates are planned for the forthcoming races. He explained, as quoted by Autosport:

"We have updates coming up this summer break - I hope in Zandvoort and I hope again in Baku or the race after Baku which is Singapore.

"What I can tell you is there are substantive numbers that should add up to us being back in a position of fighting for points.

"It's achieved through a number of things. It's aerodynamic updates, you're going see a suspension update, and you're going see weight coming off the car. So it's fundamentally three core routes wherever we're doing this.

"In the world of Formula 1 they're big steps, but my reticence is you've now watched RB who had an update to take it off, Mercedes had an update but took it off. You don't normally see that, teams have confidence in what they do."

Williams is also significantly shifting its focus toward future championships. Detailed planning is already in motion for their 2025 and 2026 race cars, with Vowles explaining their aggressive forward-thinking strategy.

"We're also investing in 25, so our car in the wind tunnel is not the 2024 car, it's been the 2025 one for quite a few months.

"The reason why we're doing this is not because I believe in 2025, but I want to get the 2026 car in the tunnel as soon as possible, but still have a sensible 2025 season.

"Everything we're doing is basically forward borrowing against getting everything as quickly as possible into 2026. With the additional resources, we now have team members focused on '24, '25 '26, and a little bit of '27 as well at the same time.

"That's a change for Williams, we were more used to working one year in advance or even on the current year. And as you can imagine, when you do that within the organisation, it takes time to adapt.

"Nothing I've told you here is special sauce; Mercedes does it, Red Bull does it, but for Williams it's a large departure."

The F1 season will restart with the Dutch Grand Prix at the end of this month on 23-25 August.