New Tech Director Speaks...

31.05.2004
"We know where the problems are," says Michael
Sam Michael, WilliamsF1's Technical Director, has a clear concept of which components need improvement. However, he advises against euphoria.

After six rounds of the 2004 Formula One World Championship, the BMW WilliamsF1 Team has yet to score a Grand Prix victory. Consequently, the engineers of the Anglo-German partnership are working flat-out in order to optimise the WilliamsF1 BMW FW26.

"We’ve got a short-term plan for this season and then obviously medium to long-term plans for next year already", explained Michael, "How long it takes us to turn around this year is a bit hard to debate, but we’re concentrating on three or four main areas to try and improve the car. We know where the problems are, it’s a matter of how fast we can bring about those improvements."

Despite the lack of performance in recent Formula One races, the motivation within the BMW WilliamsF1 Team remains high. Everyone is giving his all in order to ensure that Ralf Schumacher and Juan Pablo Montoya have a winning car at their disposal.

"We’re definitely not about giving up on the season," confirmed Michael, "We’re not that far behind that it’s not that recoverable. In Malaysia we finished within ten seconds of Ferrari and we’ve had a couple of bad races since then."

The Australian is optimistic that the BMW WilliamsF1 Team has the potential to improve considerably after the coming Grands Prix. "We’ve got to spend the next two or three races sorting out the current performance and then hopefully we can bring some more improvements on board", he said. The BMW WilliamsF1 Team is currently fourth in the Constructors' Championship.

They've been saying that they know what the problem is, but it sounds like BMW is reviewing their plan and progress. I don't think the moves of Patrick Head and Sam Michael indicate too much more than Patrick letting Sam have more responsibility. They haven't said if someone else will fill Sam's role.

But I also remember JPM saying that they knew what the problem was last year and it once they fixed it, the car came around. He said that this year, the problem isn't as clear-cut.

If it was clear-cut, it makes you wonder why they haven't made more progress on it up to now.