Williams, a powerhouse in the 1980s and ’90s before faltering the last few years, is having a resurgence. The team, which has won 114 Grands Prix, nine constructors’ titles and seven drivers’ championships, is now fighting for fifth place. That would be its highest finish since 2017.
“We put work into this, but what you see today is just the result of getting a thousand people pointing in the right way, with some basic foundations in place,” James Vowles, the team principal, said in an interview in May. “I’m happy with the progress we’re showing, as it shows the direction for the future.”
The team, which finished last four times from 2018 to 2022, went through a long period of financial strife, fears of collapse and a major change in ownership from the founding Williams family to a New York-based investment firm.
With the ownership of the firm, Dorilton Capital, which bought Williams in 2020, and the stewardship of Vowles, whose contract was renewed last month, a fallen giant is beginning to reawaken.
It has 55 points this year, already more than it amassed from 2022 to 2024.
“If you had asked me a year ago, when I signed the contract, that in some qualifyings we would be only three-tenths off pole and beating a Ferrari or Red Bull or Mercedes, I would have definitely signed the contract even earlier and even happier,” said Carlos Sainz, who moved over from Ferrari after it signed Lewis Hamilton for this year. “The team is on a very strong trajectory.”
Vowles, an engineer at heart, won titles with Mercedes, rising to motorsport strategy director, and his appointment by Williams in early 2023 as team principal signaled a new chapter.
Vowles discovered an organization that had fallen “20 years behind” in some departments, including its car design document, which logs thousands of components, and was simply an enormous Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. That was left over from Williams’ financial woes and lack of investment.
There are some new facilities, and others under development, and the team’s work force has doubled to about 1,100 at its headquarters in the English countryside.
“Adding people isn’t a fix, though,” Vowles said. “Adding people into a structured manner with the right processes and systems, is.
“To implement a piece of software you buy it, put it in. That’s easy. In the grand scheme of things, to get people to believe in the direction we’re going to, it’s hard. If I take Williams very specifically, it was surviving for many years, and survival does some strange things to you. You become isolated from what you’re doing, fearful of changing too far outside the boundaries of what you’re used to.
“My job in all of that is to lend my hand to everyone and say, ‘This is what we’re going to do, this is how we’re going to do it, and this is how we’re going to do it together.’”
Vowles recognizes the scale of the task.
“There’s something called change saturation,” he said. “If you have a business that’s changed, and has been zigzagging for a few years, I could be seen as another zigzag on the journey, but fortunately we have the results to back it up, so what happens with that is your cultural change accelerates, so we’re in a good pathway.”
Vowles is steadfast that Williams’ resources are being spent looking long-term, with new Formula 1 regulations going into effect in 2026.
“Most of the work that 1,100 people are doing is on next year, it’s not this year, and I’m OK with that because it’s a clean sheet of paper,” he said.
“We’re not championship-level in any part of the organization yet, but every single part of the organization is moving up towards that benchmark, that’s what I’m encouraged by. A lot of the infrastructure required to produce bits at the right quality at the right time won’t be in place for ’26. When people ask me ‘Why are you not fighting for ’26?’ — we’re still missing a lot of what I consider foundational bits. Our simulator capability will be online in ’26 for the ’27 and ’28 cars, so that’s good.”
That means Williams “should have a car that’s able to win races” in 2028, Vowles said, while also establishing a sustainable business model.
Williams’ prospects have also been helped by the commitment of its two drivers.
Alex Albon, who joined in 2022, signed a long-term deal in 2024. Sainz was pursued by several teams after his Ferrari departure, but he was persuaded by Vowles to join Williams.
“Both individuals have insights about where we’re going, how we’re investing, and both joined us because they believe in the journey we’re on, and that’s before we started performing like we have this year,” Vowles said. “There’s results to back it up, but both can see what the future vision is. It’s not fictitious; the investment is real.
“They’re both leaders. Twenty of their words are far more powerful than me talking for an hour. They talk from the heart, they talk with passion, and they’re able to lead the team in ways that I can’t.”
Vowles is hopeful that Williams can hold onto fifth place.
“I think we’ve left 10 to 15 points on the table — now, teams always will — but my frustration is I want perfection,” he said. “It could be critical come the end of the season. We have a car that should be able to score points all season long. Generally speaking that’s where the car is; that should put us in contention to be fighting for fifth.”
Williams has loftier long-term goals, and the foundations are almost in place to make those ambitions attainable rather than fanciful.
“There’s people here who have passion that pours out of their heart when you spend five minutes with them,” Vowles said. “They want this team to be successful — so do I — but almost all those individuals that have been through 20 years of hardship, I want them to have the opportunity to feel what it is to taste success again.”
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