JANUARY 31, 2003

The new Williams

Williams has unveiled its new FW25 chassis in Barcelona this morning and all the indications are that the new car is radically different in concept to previous cars which culminated in last year's FW24. Technical director Patrick Head says that the new car is not radical because the regulations do not allow for anything radical these days but says that the layout of the new car is very different. The first indications are that the car has the same low rear end which made the Ferrari so different to the other cars last year. Williams seem to have followed this thinking which is not surprising given that the aerodynamic work was done by ex-Ferrari engineer Antonia Terzi. This has meant other substantial changes to the layout of the new car. Head says that the team's analysis suggests that the changes will make a much better car but concedes that it is still going to be difficult to get to a situation where Williams has the same speed and reliability as the Italian cars.