Williams positive ahead of new season

The Williams team are looking positive ahead of the new 2014 Formula One World Championship season.

The Williams team had a terrible season last year.

The Oxfordshire based team who have taken seven F1 drivers titles and nine F1 constructors championships over the years finished ninth in the standings in 2013.

Former driver Pastor Maldonado was very critical of the team during the season, with the now Lotus driver finishing in the points just once all season. With a tenth place finish in Hungary scoring 1 point.

During his rookie season Valtteri Bottas looked consistent, only retiring once, but like his team-mate, only finishing in the points once in the USA. A eighth place finish scoring him 4 points.

It left Williams last of all the established teams and only marginally ahead of both Caterham and Marussia.

‘The Williams team has never really come out before a season and said where we want to finish, but P9 in the championship last year was really difficult for us and not where we want to be so we have to improve on that – there is no choice! We are not in F1 to make up the numbers and finish at the back of the grid, we want to be winning grands prix again,’ Williams Deputy Team Principal Claire Williams told Sky Sports.

Over the course of pre-season and winter testing Williams have looked strong.

Various management reshuffles have taken place, with Pat Symonds restructuring the team as Technical director.

The team have switched from Renault to Mercedes power, whilst the team have also waved goodbye to Maldonado and welcomed Felipe Massa to the team from Ferrari.

Those changes appear to have been positive with good times and mileage set by the Williams team throughout the test sessions in Spain and Bahrain.

‘Everyone at the team has been fighting really, really hard, we have made a lot of changes to the team over the past nine months and we hope they will take effect this year. If we could get both cars into the Q3 – the top ten on the grid – and then achieve point-scoring positions in every race that would be fantastic.

‘In testing you never know 100 per cent where you are going to be when you get to the first race afterwards, but it has been a really positive pre-season for us in Jerez and the two Bahrain ones. Felipe had a time that was quicker than everyone else’s and we completed the second highest number of kilometres behind Mercedes, so it has been really positive.

‘We have achieved everything we wanted to and we were able as well, after proving our reliability, to work on our performance. It stands us in really good stead, but you won’t know where everyone is until we get to the first race.’ she concluded.

Do not forget to enter the Vital F1 Prediction Competition!

Entries must be made before qualifying begins – CLICK HERE.