The 2025 F1 season has been a story of resurgence for Williams, with the team making notable strides to establish itself as a consistent midfield contender.
Under the leadership of team principal James Vowles and with the addition of Carlos Sainz from Ferrari, the Grove-based outfit has transformed its FW47 into a more versatile machine, scoring points in all but four races so far this season.
Yet, despite this progress, Sainz believes that if the team wants to push higher up the F1 order in the coming years, it must adopt a radically different approach to car design under the new regulations arriving in 2026.
Hungary Highlights Long-Standing Weakness
At last weekend’s Hungarian Grand Prix, Williams qualified and raced outside the sharp end of the grid despite its otherwise improved form this season. For Sainz, that performance underlined an aerodynamic weakness the team has struggled with for years.
"It's [Hungaroring] always been a difficult track for the team," said Sainz, quoted by Motorsport.com. "We had quite a long debrief after qualifying because obviously I'm coming from the team that was on pole going back to a team that was P13 with me.
"I could give them very strong feedback on why this car is lagging around a track like this. Obviously for this year we cannot do anything, but for the future hopefully it's a very big learning curve for the team to know how we need to develop the Formula 1 car to be successful and competitive also in tracks like Budapest or Barcelona.”
The Spaniard highlighted the car’s aerodynamic deficiencies, particularly in long, flowing corners.
"We have relatively poor aero characteristics in long corners where you need to hold the downforce from entry to mid-corner. We struggle with these kind of things.
"It's been a trend for a very long time. That's why long straights and sharp short corners is good for the team. But at the moment we get into long combined corners of Barcelona, Hungary, Qatar - the car really struggles.
"It needs a very big design philosophy change for the future. We're trying to understand where and what to change to make sure that next year's car is a bit more of an all-rounder and gives us a better platform to work in multiple tracks."
Eyes on 2026, Focus on Consistency for 2025
While Sainz is encouraged by the team’s collective vision, he admitted there is little scope to address these core weaknesses until next year’s car hits the track.
"It's been a very strong start to our time together in terms of the way we want to develop the team, the car, the interaction with Alex, with James,” said Sainz.
"It's not like we can exploit the feedback of the two drivers and the intentions that we have to develop this car, what we need, because we are not putting it in the wind tunnel to develop.
"That's where next year is going to be a lot more challenging for the team and for ourselves to see if we can actually improve the main weaknesses of this car that are very clear in tracks like this.
"From my side on the shorter term, I'll just focus on weekend executions. There's nothing really we can do to the aero or to the set-up of the car in the end.”
This constraint has forced Sainz to focus on maximizing performance through on-track execution. At the Hungaroring, he experimented with multiple setups in a bid to unlock extra pace.
"I tried three or four different set-ups over the [Hungary] weekend to try and find an extra around tracks like this,” he explained. “I ended up reverting to the car that gave me the very competitive qualifying in Miami, Imola, at the beginning of the season.
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"The problem is I think we've got a bit outdeveloped and come to a track where it's very difficult for us.
"The second half of the season, I will just seek consistency with set-up, consistency with the car, and just make sure we execute clean weekends."
With Formula 1’s next big regulation reset just over a year away, Sainz’s message is clear: Williams’ next step forward depends on building a machine capable of thriving across every type of circuit – not just those that suit its long-established strengths.
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