AT&T Williams F1

Meet Rod Nelson, the team's Chief Operations Engineer. Rod is responsible for all trackside operations during the 18 race season.

PERSONAL
Age 46
Star sign Virgo
Start date at Williams F1 1st March 2007

Why Williams F1? I’ve liked them from afar for a long time, and this job was an expansion of the previous job I had with another team. This team has got the right philosophy; they're racers.

Are you aware of the team's history? Very much so, and it's a real honour to work for them. I came for an interview with Peter Collins about 25 years ago, when the team was based in Didcot. I wanted a summer job while I was at university.

Previous jobs in F1 R&D engineer at Arrows in 1990 & '91, then I was at Simtek from '92 to '95 as a race engineer. When Simtek went bust, I returned to Arrows before moving to Renault, where I was a race engineer.

Hobbies I love playing golf and I play the saxophone, albeit not as often as I should. I also enjoy looking after my young daughter, Ines, and I'm particularly proud that I climbed the UK's Three Peaks - Ben Nevis, Scarfell Pike and Snowdon - at the age of 40!

PROFESSIONAL
Describe your job at Williams F1 There are two bits to it. The obvious one is on the pitwall, where I’m responsible for the technical aspects of running the cars at tests and races, and then I'm also responsible for our vehicle dynamics department, which gives us the tools to run the car.

Do you enjoy the races? They are certainly the most enjoyable aspect of the job because they are the most intense part of what I do. Qualifying is different because it has its ups and downs, in which you're just trying to maximise what you've got.

Did AT&T Williams maximise what they had 2007? There are three or four instances where, if I had my time again, I would have done something differently. But, overall, I think it was an improvement on where we were in '06. Reliability was the biggest step forward and we also got more out of the car than we had. You never get 100 percent of the performance from the car; but you might get 97 percent and we were achieving that more in '07 than in the previous year.

How much influence have you had in the design of FW30? Operationally, I looked at serviceability and ways to make the car easier to change and to set-up for the mechanics. Taking a step back from that, I also looked at the whole performance package, pin-pointing the problems that we had with last year's car. To do that, I went straight to the relevant department within the team.

What results would please you in 08? If we finish third in the Constructors’ Championship, that would be a fantastic result. Even finishing fourth would be a big achievement.