Disastrous start
Last season ended with promising results for Williams, fifth in the Constructors’ Championship and aiming to further improve their performance in this world championship. A 2026 that, at least so far, has not lived up to the pre-season plans: even absent from the pre-season tests in Barcelona due to delays in the development of the FW48, the Grove car has not proven competitive in the first scheduled tests.
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Signs of recovery
However, with the arrival of highly experienced engineers from Mercedes, McLaren, and Alpine, the team has made significant progress, achieving the first points finish with both drivers in Miami, while Sainz repeated the feat in Canada. An encouraging outcome, although team principal James Vowles wanted to indicate the period when the FW48 of Carlos Sainz and Alex Albon will be able to more frequently reach the top 10.
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When will the chance for a ‘perfect weekend’ come?
In an episode of The Vowles Verdict, the British manager specified that Williams still has a lot of work to do, aiming for higher results starting from a certain point in the season: “What I know is that the work we have planned will last until the August break, and even a bit beyond – he commented – at the end of all this we should put ourselves in a position to regularly score points every weekend from that moment on. Until then, I think we should be able to get closer and closer to a perfect weekend, scoring points, but not necessarily becoming the fifth fastest team. For now, that distinction belongs to Alpine. We still need to gain a few tenths.”
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