sport

Williams Profile

Widely accepted as a member of Formula One's 'Big Three', Williams are currently struggling to make their way out of the rut that befell the team in recent years.

The team will undoubtedly go down as the team of the '90s, winning five Constructors' titles between 1992 and 1997 along with four Drivers' titles. However, life for Williams was not always so rosy.

After their creation in 1968, the Williams team struggled for the next 11 years and it was not until the 1979 season, with a car designed by Patrick Head, that they began to establish themselves as one of the top F1 teams of the modern era.

In that season they secured their first win (Silverstone) and went on to record four further wins to finish second behind Ferrari on the Constructors' table.

The team went one better in 1980 as the Constructors' Championship duly arrived and they won it again in 1981. The team also had success with a Drivers' Championship in 1980 for Alan Jones and 1982 for Keke Rosberg - a strange season in which the Finn managed only one win.

In 1985 Williams signed a deal with Honda, a partnership that would take them to the 1986 and 1987 Constructors' titles. However, the defection of Honda to rivals McLaren in 1988 was a huge blow to Williams, resulting in them having to use the Judd engine for a singularly dreadful season and losing Nigel Mansell to Ferrari.

In 1989 Williams secured a deal with French company Renault and slowly began to recover their form, although it was not until 1991 that they mounted another serious attempt on the Championship. In 1992 and 1993 Williams stamped their authority on the F1 in emphatic style as they took the Constructors' and Drivers' Championships with Mansell and Prost on the grid.

Another Constructors' win followed in 1994 despite the death of Ayrton Senna after just three races. 1995 proved a change from the norm as they lost out to the Benetton team but normality, and the Constructors' Title, was restored in 1996 and 1997.

However, the end of the association with Renault before the 1998 season heralded a difficult year with an unreliable and under-powered Mecachrome engine.

In 1998 and 1999 Williams struggled with the Mecachrome/Supertec, but it was a losing battle. Despite heroic performances from Ralf Schumacher the team suffered two of the worst seasons in its history.

For 2000 they had a new engine, courtesy of BMW, and the new package was competitive virtually out of the box with Ralf taking a fine third in Australia. Although the Williams were no match for the Ferrari or McLaren, it was definitely the best of the rest courtesy of some fine performances from Ralf and youngest-ever points scorer Jenson Button.

For 2001 Williams retained Ralf and partnered him with Colombian CART champion Juan Pablo Montoya. Sir Frank has never been afraid to go against public opinion as he proved when he controversially dropped both Nigel Mansell and Damon Hill after their Championship-winning seasons. Button was loaned out to Benetton in favour of Montoya, and the decision proved a good one. JPM immediately turned on the speed and made his name with an overtaking move on Michael Schumacher in Brazil.

The success graph was in an upwards curve in 2001 as Ralf won three races and Montoya one. Surely they would challenge more in 2002? Sadly not.

Aero faults with the FW24 were put down to a lack of attention from the departing aerodynamicist Geoff Willis and despite still having the

most powerful engine on the grid, the team only came good for one race win.

2003, though, was a much better season for the team, who came close to overthrowing Ferrari in the Constructors' battle, thanks to four victories and numerous podium finishes. A late spurt from Ferrari though saw Williams finish 14 points adrift.

The team unveiled a radical car for the 2004 season, sporting 'tusks' on its unique front wing. It proved to be a mistake, however: the results were as ugly as the car.

By the end of the season, the tusks had been ditched, replaced with a conventional single-keel front-wing. Out too went Patrick Head, the long-standing technical director to be replaced by Australian Sam Michael.

The state of flux was exacerbated by disappointing performances of Montoya, who had already signed for McLaren, and Ralf who announced in August that he was departing to Toyota. As expected, the team signed Mark Webber as a replacement, but were foiled in their attempts to re-sign Jenson Button - although he did agree to join the team the following year.

Only until 20 minutes before the launch of their 2005 charger in January was test driver Antonio Pizzonia informed that Nick Heidfeld had beaten him in the fight for the second seat. It was a remarkable state of affairs, symbolic of the paralysis that had apparently seeped into the management of a team struggling to retain its status as one of F1's big guns.

Perhaps inevitably, therefore, team sank even deeper in 2005 with the third-choice Heidfeld the only bright light in a dreadful season. Consigned to be a midfield runner, Williams' woes though weren't restricted to the track only as when the engines quieted down the real drama began.

As a consequence of their dismal season, a blame game between themselves and BMW broke out which resulted in the car manufacturer ending their relationship with Williams in favour of buying the Sauber team. Major sponsor HP also withdrew their backing, while Button, who had been so keen to join Williams a year previously, decided Honda could offer him a better chance of winning the drivers' title and bought his way out of his contract.

For 2006 Sir Frank Williams signed Cosworth as his team's engine supplier while the departure of Heidfeld to BMW, meant Nico Rosberg was been given his big break - another questionable move. Nonetheless, Rosberg shone for the team at the start of the year, claiming seventh place and, more remarkably, the fastest race lap time, while Webber's P6 meant Williams bagged a double points-scoring finish in the opening race of the campaign.

Alas, it was to be the highlight of Williams' season.

The following race, Malaysia, signalled the start of bad things to come as even though Rosberg and Williams qualified third and fourth for the race, neither saw the chequered flag, succumbing to hydraulic and engines failures. It was the first of five double retirements for the team.

There were, though, glimpses of the Williams of old during the 2006 season, as Webber showed in Monaco that when the FW28 worked, it worked well. But all too often it would stop working sooner rather than later. The Aussie spent much of the Monaco GP Sunday afternoon in third place before exhaust problems on lap 48 ended his race early. It was to be the team's best chance of a podium finish.

Three top-eight finishes from Webber and two from Rosberg saw Williams plummet to eighth place in the Constructors' Championship, a Another great result in Germany saw the Austrian clinched fourth place before it was back to Rosberg to continue the battle. The German sealed five points finishes in the final seven grands prix taking Williams up to fourth place in the Constructors' Championship.

It was a marked improvement from the team, who not only found a bit of pace but also put their reliability gremlins behind them.

With rookie driver Kazuki Nakajima partnering Rosberg, the 2008 season was yet another hard one for the Grove-based team. Their season started with a third-place finish from Rosberg and a sixth place by Nakajima in the season-opener in Melbourne, but things went downhill after that.

Rosberg appeared to be fighting a lone battle at times as the FW30 wasn't very reliable and Nakajima wasn't really setting the world alight in his first season. The German also claimed a second-place finish in Singapore, but Williams still finished a lowly eighth in the Constructors' Championship with just 26 points.

With Rosberg's contract running until the end of 2009, there was never any doubt that he would stay on, but the team surprisingly opted to retain the underperforming Nakajima.

Things looked very good for Williams at the start of the season when they were part of the so-called 'Diffuser Three'. But unlike Brawn and Toyota, Williams failed to cash in while the rest of the pack were still struggling. Rosberg did his best, regularly scoring points and qualifying in the top 10, but there was rarely any sight of a podium finish. His best spell came during the European season when he claimed two fourth-place finishes and three P5s. He finished the season a respectable seventh in the Drivers' Championship with 34.5 points.

Sadly his partner finished at the wrong end of the table without a single point to his name. The announcement that Nakajima's contract wouldn't be renewed hardly came as surprise and neither did Rosberg's confirmation that he would leave the team at the end of the season. The German had stated several times during the year that if the team fail to offer him a Championship-winning car he'd be off.

He was true to his word and joined Mercedes GP once his contract expired. That left Williams with two seats to fill and they decided to go for an old head and a rookie in Rubens Barrichello and highly rated youngster Nico Hulkenberg.

Teaming up with Cosworth engines in a "long-term partnership", the Williams FW32 showed signs of promise and at times delivered. Overall, though, it fell short of the standards many Williams had hoped for.

Despite having pace in qualifying, the FW32 lacked it over long-distances, resulting in the team falling down the order more often than not. In fact, Williams failed again to make it onto the podium with their best result being Barrichello's P4 in the European GP.

However, there was one shining moment for the team as Hulkenberg defied the odds to grab pole position at the Brazilian GP. The German was 1.049s quicker than Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel. Hulkenberg, though, dropped to P8 by the end of the race. The team finished the campaign in sixth place with 69 points.

As for 2011, Hulkenberg has been dropped in favour of Venezuelan driver Pastor Maldonado, who will partner Barrichello - again in a mix of youth and experience. Williams have also made changes away from the track, opting to list the team on the stock exchange in a bid to secure the team's long-term future in Formula One.

And although Williams fans may be overjoyed to finally own a piece of their favourite F1 team, what they will really be hoping for it a victory to signal the return of Williams...