Team principal James Vowles expects Williams to start moving up the standings again from now on—he’s particularly optimistic about the period after the summer break
Williams isn’t writing off the 2026 Formula 1 season just yet. After James Vowles had previously announced that his team would introduce a B-spec version of the FW48 after the summer break, he has now confirmed once again that the Williams will be “almost a completely new car” in a few months.
Speaking to Sky during the Spielberg race this weekend, Vowles explained that there will already be a somewhat larger update package for the car at the next Grand Prix in Silverstone. Further “small parts” are then set to follow before the summer break in Spa and Budapest.
According to Vowles, there will be another upgrade at the first race after the break in Zandvoort, which will also reduce the weight of the FW48, and by the time of the Grand Prix in Baku at the end of September, the car will, according to the team principal, have little in common with the current model.
The question, however, is just how good the revamped Williams will actually be. After all, at the last race in Spielberg, the team found itself at the very back of the midfield. They managed to beat only Cadillac and Aston Martin after both cars were eliminated in Q1 during qualifying.
And although Williams was already out of contention the previous weekend in Barcelona, Vowles firmly believes that his team can still turn things around in 2026. He emphasizes that, compared to the start of the season, they have already made “positive strides.”
Vowles is confident: They can close the gap
In fact, Williams had a better run in Miami, Canada, and Monaco, scoring points in three consecutive races. Vowles attributes the setback since Barcelona, among other things, to the fact that the other teams have recently introduced updates, while the new parts for Williams are still on the way.
“I’m impressed by how competitive the field has become,” he says, praising, among other things, the Racing Bulls’ rapid pace of development. The Red Bull sister team already had both cars finish in the points in Barcelona and most recently led the midfield at Spielberg.
At the same time, however, Vowles also emphasizes that Williams’ goal is to close the current gap to the Racing Bulls and all other midfield teams. “I think that’s realistic given our pace of development,” the team principal says, sounding surprisingly optimistic.
His explanation: “I don’t think many others will achieve a performance gain on the scale we’re planning by that point [after the summer break].” Or to put it another way: In his opinion, Williams will bring more performance to the car in the coming weeks than almost any other team.
Although the competitors are also continuing to develop their cars, Vowles therefore expects that Williams will succeed in closing the gap thanks to superior development. “Of course, that’s not yet what we want to achieve,” he says about the season so far.
However, he sees a good chance that Williams will be competing much further up the field again after the summer break.