WILLIAMS IN DISARRAY WITH CAR DELAYS
The Williams Formula 1 team was expected to miss the whole of the first two days of pre-season testing, as MN closed for press on Monday.
The squad finished bottom of the constructors’ standings last year and its 2019 campaign got off to a bad start with the new FW42 not expected to start testing until today (Wednesday) “at the earliest”.
Williams was racing to finish the build of its new car and had to cancel a planned pre-test shakedown, before announcing last weekend it would miss the opening day of testing.
The car was still being finished back at the team’s Grove headquarters on Monday morning, with only a show car in the 2019 colours present at Barcelona testing.
The initial delay announcement led to doubts Williams would be able to get the car to Barcelona in time to belatedly start testing on Tuesday morning as hoped.
Deputy team principal Claire Williams has now admitted the team doubts it will run on-track before Wednesday.
“It is looking more likely than not that we will now not be in a position to run on track until Wednesday at the earliest,” she said.
“This is obviously extremely disappointing, but it is unfortunately the situation we are in.
“We will be getting the FW42 on track as soon as we are able.”
The news means Williams is poised to miss at least half of the first test and 25% of the total amount of preseason track time. It also limits the seat time for Williams’ inexperienced line-up of F1 debutant George Russell and returnee Robert Kubica – who last raced in the series in 2010.
When the first delays were announced, Claire Williams said: “Our absolute priority is to always ensure we bring a car to the track that is the best that it can be and sometimes that takes longer than you’d anticipate or like. It’s clearly not ideal, but equally it’s not the end of the world.”