Williams Start the long haul back to the front...

[shazbot]

Williams appoints Somerville and Gillan in ongoing technical rethink - F1 news - AUTOSPORT.com (http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/92706)

Good news from Grove at last.

[555-04Q2]

Until they get a decent budget in place, I don't see them ever returning to their glory days :(

[555-04Q2]

P.S. Hope I am wrong though :)

[Ranger]

Adrian Newey and Christian Horner recently said that the most testing times of their tenure at Red Bull was changing the Jaguar mindset and infrastructure.

Infrastructure/staff can be changed but the mindset is something that is hard to change without ownership.

One wonders whether the latter has been the biggest problem at Williams for the last several years, and whether appointing new people will do anything to change that.

Food for thought.

[Stuartf12007]

Williams Renault

[steveaki13]

I hope Williams can get better, and challenge for podiums again some day. I think any more would take more work and money than they have now.

But at least after many years of struggles at least the team appear to be trying to take positive steps.

[ioan]

With RedBull, Ferrari, McLaren and Mercedes around Williams have little chances to challenge for podiums on pace alone.

[Hawkmoon]

Personally I don't think a collaborative effort from Colin Chapman, Gordon Murray, John Barnard, Andrian Newey and Rory Byrne could get Williams back to the front any time soon.

The team hasn't been close to winning for 7 seasons and each passing year sees them slip further behind. They're alot like Sauber in that they can start a season with reasonablr pace but steadily fall behind as the season progresses. I don't think they have the resources to develop a car during a season and the longer they stay away from the front the harder it will be to get those resources.

They no longer attract front running drivers. In fact they now employ pay drivers (Nakajima, Maldonado) and even went so far as to dump a promising rookie (Hulkenburg) for cash.

Sad as it is, Williams are done unless they sell up to a big spending manufacturer or corporation. And if they did that, would it still be Williams?

[zako85]

I could be wrong, but I would disagree about the statement that all of Williams F1's troubles is merely due to the fact that the team is "poor". Certainly, it's poorer than McLaren or Mercedes but it probably has more resources than the rest of the midfield. Consider these facts, Barriccello was paid over 5million euros only last year. The team has enough resources to develop its own KERS and transmissions. Last year the team posted a profit, very meager but still. I keep reading about addition of super modern facilities every once in a while. No one knows what was the deal with Hulkenburg. There had been a rumor floating that he asked "too much". There's been an interview recently where Hulkenburg blamed his former manager for this. All of this suggests that the team is not being forced to pinch pennies as badly as some other teams. The failure is probably mechanical and managerial. However, it's hard not to draw parallels between the Williams of the first decade of 21st century and the Lotus of 1980s. I don't think they can leapfrog to the front yet, but it's scandalous that they trail even the midfield right now. Williams certainly needs to do something radical. New designers, new management, new car, and even new drivers.

[Robinho]

so they have a new engine and new engineering/design team, the car has improved the last few races, could this be the turning point for Williams?

[UltimateDanGTR]

so they have a new engine and new engineering/design team, the car has improved the last few races, could this be the turning point for Williams?

One has to hope so.

[steveaki13]

Good to see Williams and Renault again, but I don't think any past glories will return in the near future I'm afraid.

[Malbec]

Sadly I'm still sceptical about Williams, they should have gone for people already in F1, preferably already experienced in achieving a lot with little money. For a team like Williams headhunting around Renault which is losing a lot of good people would have been a good place to start.

Instead they're recruiting people who haven't been in the sport for a while.... There's a whiff of desperation around their recent signings.

[Koz]

so they have a new engine and new engineering/design team, the car has improved the last few races, could this be the turning point for Williams?

But it is interesting to note how many of these new engineering folk have been responsible for this improved performance?

Perhaps we might even see regression...

[Koz]

And secondly, why the hell are they thinking about Renault engines now?
Did anyone think that the Cosworth would out preform a Renault - or any other engine on the grid?

[555-04Q2]

And secondly, why the hell are they thinking about Renault engines now?
Did anyone think that the Cosworth would out preform a Renault - or any other engine on the grid?

I think the Cosworth engines were a lot cheaper which is why they went that route. As said before, until they find some money, Williams aint going to improve dramatically. They need a new partner or a big sponsor.

[Koz]

I think the Cosworth engines were a lot cheaper which is why they went that route. As said before, until they find some money, Williams aint going to improve dramatically. They need a new partner or a big sponsor.

Do you think the Williams budget is significantly lower than FI, Sauber, SRT that they couldn't afford a decent engine?
So low that they need pay drivers? And engines that weren't competitive when they were last used in F1 4 years earlier? A better question is, when was the last time Cosworth engines were competitive?

Did Sir Frank expect a different result? Maybe he should have hired a pay driver instead of Rubens so he could afford better engines?

[555-04Q2]

Do you think the Williams budget is significantly lower than FI, Sauber, SRT that they couldn't afford a decent engine?
So low that they need pay drivers? And engines that weren't competitive when they were last used in F1 4 years earlier? A better question is, when was the last time Cosworth engines were competitive?

Did Sir Frank expect a different result? Maybe he should have hired a pay driver instead of Rubens so he could afford better engines?

Williams used to have one of the biggest budgets. Now they are mid-pack with regards to budget size. Is it any coincidence then that they are now running mid-pack? They used to lead the way with their aero packages, active suspension designs etc etc. Their budget is nowhere near the size of Red Bull, Ferrari, Mercedes, McLaren etc. They are unlikely to move forward until they can also raise $200 - $400 million a season. They may not need pay drivers now, but Frank has never beenthe best payer when it comes to drivers, something that pushed Button to leave them, amongst others.

It's sad to see a team with such a great record and history in F1 running so poorly for over a decade now. Until Frank changes his business model, I don't see them ever returning to the top while the likes of Ferrari & Co are still in F1 with virtually unlimited budget and factory resources.

[ReNoir]

I for one hope that they do improve, I'm not expecting huge leaps or gains just bottom end of points, maybe later on a few shock wins even, that would be amazing. I used to always love seeing the new williams cars at the start of every season - they were different but the same in some regards - that and I loved the old v10 BMW haha.

[zako85]

Let's not get overly optimistic about this engine deal. We all know that a strong, championship-winning engine is a necessary but not sufficient condition for becoming a strong competitor in Formula 1. There are many examples of mid-field teams obtaining only mild results using the same engine as the top teams. All pieces of puzzle have to fit together before Williams F1 can bounce back.

A related side question is, what does this all mean for Cosworth's participation in Formula 1 after 2013? With so many teams jumping the ship, it's not clear whether Cosworth will have enough engine customers by 2014 in order to justify the costs of development of a new V6 turbo engine. Companies like Renault, Mercedes, or Ferrari can swallow at least part of the fixed costs of engine development because their continued participation in Formula 1 promotes the brands for their consumer product divisions, but Cosworth is not in the same position. The way I see it, unless Cosworth finds a sponsor for engine development, they probably will not continue doing business in Formula 1. However, the idea of finding a business partner for engine development is not that unlikely. For a large financially healthy global car company with no Formula 1 experience, it may prove cheaper to contract a company like Cosworth to develop their Formula 1 engines instead of starting from scratch. Think of the kind of relationships Mercedes had with Ilmor or Ford with Cosworth. One good candidate is Hyundai, now the fourth largest car manufacturer in the world (counting Kia sales as well) and growing very fast.

[pete c]

hi guys, one thing to remember about cosworth, is that they have already been down the v6 turbo route back in the last turbo period.
1.5 ltr v6 making 1000 bhp in race trim.
seem to remember in robsons "cosworth" book that they still have 25 of these engines on the shelf.
old technology i know but they have already been there and done that
food for thought



cheers pete

always wondered why they named themselves after my dog