Williams team principal James Vowles is willing to lose fifth place in Formula 1’s constructors’ championship after halting development of its current car due to a longer-term focus on trying to fight for titles again in the future.
In the first part of the season, Williams was often fighting for points with both cars, registering three top-five finishes and enjoying a run of four consecutive double-points results from Jeddah to Monaco to sit fifth overall. However, its advantage over Aston Martin, Sauber and Racing Bulls has been cut in recent rounds, with 25 points covering all four teams, but despite this Vowles says an upgrade introduced in Belgium is the last development work that will take place for the 2025 car.
“Everything is switched off,” Vowles said. “It’s already done. It’s decided. And that was done in agreement with the shareholders.
“I really enjoy the fact we’re fifth this year – I think it’s a fantastic element for ourselves, for our partners, for anyone that’s associated with us – but the goal of this team is to win world championships. And you’re simply not going to do that by continuing fighting for a position or two in a constructors’ championship.
“So that decision was taken in January. And the pathway we’re on, this [Belgium] update we did, it wasn’t even guaranteed we would do. It was the element of a few bits that we did in the tunnel across January, February and a little bit in March. That’s it.
“We’re not doing anything more. I won’t do anything more. And if that results in us being sixth in the championship or seventh, so be it.”
Vowles says he is not surprised Williams is currently fifth in the standings despite limiting the work it would do in developing this year’s car, pointing to the way the team took advantage of its early performance levels.
“For sure I reflect on our season this year and we’ve had elements where we’ve delivered,” he said. “And when we’ve delivered, it’s as a result of a number of iterations of cars in front of us. The car going into the year, if you ask me, I would say it’s going to be a very close battle between P5 all the way down to probably P8, which I think is the reflection of it.
“And I think if you look at our performance up until Imola and Miami, you’d say, ‘Yeah, the car is [strong], we’re fifth, fourth, because we’re picking up good results. We’re not making any mistakes with it, but the field is very compact.’
“In Imola and Miami, I think it took the world a little bit by surprise as to how far we could push this car and develop this car. Then the development race kicked in and others have added performance, added performance, added performance. Ferrari has done a brilliant job in that regard. And it was our update in Spa that brought us back into a position where we’re again able to get the car into the top 10. That’s my assessment of it.
“I’m not surprised we’re fifth. I think any team could have had fortunate results along the way through. We did a good job when the car was quick and were able to pick up the points that we could. That said, I could already point you towards 18 points we didn’t pick up at that time.
“So I’m not surprised. I think it’s a long season left to go. I was surprised more at Imola and Miami that we were as quick as we were. That’s probably why we’re fifth.”