Symonds ‘very pleased’ with progress of 2016 Williams

Williams technical director Pat Symonds says he is “very pleased” with the numbers being produced by the team’s 2016 car.

Having secured third place in the constructors’ championship in 2014, Williams matched that performance last season despite opting to switch focus to its new car at an early stage. Symonds says he made the call to take such an approach before the 2015 season had even started but is confident with the results it has produced so far.

“We’re coming off the back of two fabulous years,” Symonds said at the Autosport International Show. “For a team like Williams finishing third is an enormous achievement, we really are racing right at the front now against people with enormous budgets, such bigger teams, and I think we should be very proud of what we have achieved in the last couple of years.

“During 2015 we did back off a little bit in our development to try and get 2016 in a better state. It’s a difficult decision to make and it’s a decision I actually made after testing and implemented after the third race. It did leave me with a few sleepless nights towards the end of the year when you could see the others closing in on you, but the first part of the objective was achieved. We kept our third place and that was the first part of the objective.

“The second part of the objective of course is to produce a better car in 2016 than we produced in 2015. Have we done that? Well I can tell you that maybe in April or May but certainly the numbers we work with I’m very pleased with and I really think we’re going to have a strong year.”

Williams is set to launch its 2016 car on the morning of the first pre-season test at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya on February 22.

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