Williams thought to be first F1 team to make crucial 2026 step
Williams appears to have got the jump on its Formula 1 rivals and become the first team to make a crucial development step for 2026
Williams appears to have got the jump on its Formula 1 rivals and become the first team to switch off windtunnel development of its current car to focus fully on 2026.
While many squads are aggressively developing their challengers for next year’s all-new regulations, most are still continuing to work on developments for their 2025 F1 cars to help bring improvements over the first half of this year.
Even Aston Martin, which is known to have heavily committed resources to the future rules set, revealed in Saudi Arabia that it was now running its 2025 car in its brand-new windtunnel so it can try to work out what has gone wrong with its design and calibrate its new tools ahead of the rules shift.
It has emerged, however, that Williams has already made the complete transition to next year’s FW48, so only developments that have already been signed off, or can be done outside of a windtunnel, will find their way onto the cars of Alex Albon and Carlos Sainz this year.
Amid a super close midfield fight, Williams’ decision would open the door for it to slip behind any rivals who make significant progress with upgrades that will be coming over the forthcoming races. 
Williams team boss James Vowles said neither he nor team owners Dorilton Capital are too concerned about the final finishing position in the constructors’ championship this year.
Of far more importance to Williams is getting in place the structures and processes that are going to be critical if the team is going to have a realistic chance of fighting for race wins and championships in the future.
Asked how hard it was to convince shareholders about the potential loss of prize money this year by switching off development so soon, Vowles said: “Not difficult. The car, if I had to, I would have moved it from the windtunnel myself. I didn't have to.
“If you want to win, there is only one way to win, and you can't get caught in the now. That's how it's been completely straightforward.
“We were in a mess because we were short-termist all the way through the last 20 years. Some of it was financially driven, some of it driven by other elements, but you can't be in the sport, it has to be investment. And to be clear, investment is about five years forward to get yourself into the right position of leaping [forward]. 
“So it wasn't difficult at all, because part of the reason why I joined this entity is we had a pretty frank discussion from the very beginning over, it will take this long, it will take this amount of investment, and we cannot be driven by short-termism. That was completely aligned and agreed from the outset.”
While Williams has switched off development of its current car, Sainz said on Thursday in Jeddah that it was important the team still kept pushing to unlock more speed from it.
This comes as the squad chases a cure to balance characteristics which Sainz has highlighted and wants to dial out of its 2026 car.
Sainz said: “I’ve wanted to make sure that even if we're not going to develop this car much, we are still working as if we were going to develop this car, and we're still working as a group to make sure we understand what are the strengths and weaknesses of this car.
“Even if we're not going to have much time in the windtunnel and CFD to test things and try to change this underlying balance or issue, we are at least doing everything in our power to try and understand where it's coming from, so we can apply it to future cars.
“And this is where I'm being very pushy about. Even if we're not going to develop this car, we need to work as if we were going to - to make sure we understand as many things as possible this year, to try and apply things for next year.”
