The iconic and mighty Williams team has suffered from a dismal slump in the past years. After finishing plum last consistently for half-a-decade, the Grove-based team sit in a vastly superior seventh in the 2023 Constructors’ standings. On the back of meteoric gains, as evidenced this year, the team hope to fight for championships again in the coming years, and along the way wish they can poach 3x champion, Max Verstappen, too, per GPBlog.com.
Just 10 months into his role as Team Principal, ex-Mercedes man, James Vowles is impressed with how much the team has improved. With the highly-rated Alex Albon spearheading their charge on track, Vowles believes their performance this year acts as motivation for the team and has set the benchmark for future glory.
Keeping a close eye on the #MexicoGP action from Grove 👊 pic.twitter.com/NSGQH6jjp5
— Williams Racing (@WilliamsRacing) October 27, 2023
More than the results, it’s the attitude within the team that has impressed the Briton the most. Despite being severely handicapped in terms of equipment and technology, the team has battled through to make the most of what they have, and it has translated on the track. “We have to row with what we have. That’s what we do,” claimed Vowles to NOS (as quoted by GPBlog).
Despite archaic means, Williams want to sign Max Verstappen soon
Touching upon just how bad things are at Grove in terms of firepower, Vowles revealed, “What do we have? A lot of old equipment. Some machines are 20 years old or even broken. I have to honestly admit that I was surprised when I started here last year. It was a little worse than I feared.” Yet, the team have done a stellar job with the FW45 to jump teams like Alfa Romeo, Haas and AlphaTauri.
Vowles is bullish about the future of the team. He explained, “This season is motivating. If we perform like this with what we have [it] will really work. I’m sure of that.” As a testament to how much faith he has in this project, he even proclaimed, “It would be great if Max Verstappen wanted to drive for us in a few years. Because by then we will have everything very well together.”
Lot’s of talented superstars at Williams F1 working with the bare minimum. Hats off to everyone that clocks in at Williams Formula 1 every day.👍
— MotoGPFan35 🇻🇪🇺🇸 (@MFan35) October 28, 2023
But it’s been hard work for Vowles. After assuming the reigns from the outgoing Jost Capito, Vowles has had a mountain to climb. “You can see it in a very negative way. Yes, there is a lot of work to do. It is a challenge, but we love it. We have a lot of good people. I am working to put all the points in the right place.”
Williams need to fire on all cylinders
While the team is doing everything it can, the real dividends are earned by their drivers. In that regard, Williams seem to have struck gold with Alex Albon. 25 out of the 26 points the team have secured this year are credited to the British-Thai driver. While the FW45 has been a handful to drive, Albon has ensured he extracts the maximum from it, each race weekend.
The same cannot be said about his teammate, rookie Logan Sargeant, though. With only a single point to his name, Sargeant has double the DNFs compared to Albon. What’s more, he’s never really looked comfortable in the car.
If Williams want to push for a serious title charge in the future, they have to be firing on all cylinders, drivers included.
