Will Williams Show Up in Australia After Their Preseason Testing?
Now that both preseason testing rounds are done, the most exciting part of every Formula One season is about to begin: the first race. With the new regulations and an entirely new team joining the grid in Cadillac, the excitement has been bubbling over since the seat-filling Abu Dhabi race last year. It’s time to see which teams have shaped up and who’s falling behind. One of the most historic teams, however, had noticeable issues with getting its act together.
Last year, Williams changed its logo to mark the beginning of a new era for the team. They had consistently said they had all their focus on the 2026 regulations and had stopped upgrading their 2025 car. This was still enough to land fifth in the championship last year, but now they’re being criticized for not showing up at all during the test run in Barcelona. They were already behind on their way to Bahrain, but they put their foot down and successfully completed many laps. With a tough start to the preseason, a lot of eyes have been on them, seeing how well this early development of their car will pan out. So far, though, it has not been anything to write home about. Both drivers had middling performances on both days, with their best placement being Carlos Sainz’s P8 on day one. The general atmosphere in the Williams paddock seems to be that it was a good test, and it went to plan, but they still need to extract a lot from the car to do better this year.
Right now, it seems as though Williams is not excited to start in Australia. The performance they have lost with missing the shakedown and not having a complete car by the end of the preseason testing is going to cost them a good amount of points. While the other teams have pushed forward, and all of them seem excited about starting the season this year, Williams is a noticeable outlier, and the best that they can hope for is that whatever changes they make between the end of testing and the first race can let them jump the hurdles they ran into during testing. We will all have to wait and see how the first race pans out on March 7th, 11:00 p.m. EST.
