The Austrian Grand Prix at the Red Bull Ring saw the return to the front of the grid of Williams F1. With Felipe Massa scoring the team’s first pole position since Nico Hülkenberg in Brazil 2010 and first podium since Pastor Maldonado’s unlikely 2012 Spanish Grand Prix win, Williams have returned to being serious challengers at the business end of the grid.
With their last World Championship wins in 1997, taking the constructors title and driver’s title with Jacques Villeneuve, and last seriously challenging for race wins and titles on a weekly basis when powered by BMW engines, it has been a long time in the wilderness for the Grove based outfit. However Williams are one of only two teams for which motor racing is the sole focus of their organisation. Ferrari, Mercedes, McLaren & Marussia all have road car divisions, Red Bull and Torro Rosso are part of Dietrich Mateschitz’s Red Bull drink empire, Caterham is part of Tony Fernandes business portfolio which includes the road division of Caterham and Air Asia, Force India similarly being part of Vijay Mallya’s businesses which include United Brewers Group and Lotus are owned by the Genii Capital Investment group. The only other team on the F1 grid, Sauber who, aside from a brief period when run by BMW, have been run by Peter Sauber and have been midfield stalwart since moving into F1 from the lower formulae in 1993.
The result for the Williams’ family was great, and unlike 2010’s pole and 2012’s win, it is not a result of circumstance standing as an anomaly in an otherwise disappointing season. Sunday’s result is the culmination of hard work and development of promising results that are now starting to come good.
Formula One is a different world than the one that Sir Frank Williams and Patrick Head entered in 1977. Gone are the great names of Tyrell and Brabham replaced by constructors and corporations, with Ken Tyrell’s team bought by the British American Tobacco Company in 1999 and rebranded British American Racing. Yet Williams have endured. Winning Championships and being a dominant force throughout the 1980’s and 90’s they have created a legacy that will live on when Head and Williams retire and move on from the team.
While costs have spiralled and fortunes have been invested just to compete in Formula 1, many teams have had to be sold or shut down in the 21st century. Eddie Jordan’s Jordan F1 team was sold three times, having spells as Midland and Spyker before ending up in its current guise as Force India, Toyota started and shut down their team, Honda bought the B.A.R team and sold its parts off to Ross Brawn, BMW bought Sauber before selling it back to Peter Sauber when pulling out of the sport and Renault bought Benetton before selling it to Genii Capital to focus on engine manufacture. Only McLaren, Ferrari and Williams have not changed ownership since 2000.
The front office and Williams himself need to be applauded for making sure the team stayed solvent in an era where costs rose and sponsorships were harder to come by. Surviving off the track while the team’s form suffered on it is a testament to the hard work done by everyone at Grove, with an engine deal in place with the in-form Mercedes and a major sponsorship deal with Martini, there is a solid foundation in place for Williams to develop and continue to challenge at the business end of the grid.
In the past 37 years the Williams team has gone through all the highs and lows a Formula 1 team could possibly endure. From the tragedy of Sir Frank Williams’ accident which left him in a wheelchair and the fateful day at Imola where Ayrton Senna lost his life, to World Championships with nine constructors titles and seven drivers, Jones, Rosberg, Pique, Mansell, Prost, Hill and Villeneuve. The Williams name is synonymous with both Formula 1 and success in Formula 1, and it looks to continue to do so for many a year as Claire Williams starts to take over the running of the team from her father, and continues to show that an independent team can survive and do well in Formula 1.
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