Williams in the News: Alex’s fitness regime, pit lane runways and AI in F1
All the latest from the world of Atlassian Williams F1 Team, through the motorsport media lens
Published
10 JUL 2026
Est. reading time
6 min
With the British Grand Prix in the rear-view mirror and the summer break just a double-header away, Atlassian Williams F1 Team remains in the motorsport headlines.
Here's what the media have been saying over the past week…
How Alex trains
Men's Health UK sat down with Alex this week for an in-depth look at what it actually takes to keep an F1 driver's body race-ready across a punishing calendar.
During a race, Alex says his heart rate sits between 130 and 160 beats per minute for up to two hours, which shapes a lot of how he trains. "I like CrossFit and circuit training. We do a mixture of CrossFit and Hyrox. That kind of training is actually very similar to what we experience in the car."
Heat acclimatisation also features heavily. "Heat chamber sessions and Zone 2 cardio sessions, we try to acclimatise to the heat before we actually fly out for the race weekend," he explained, with Singapore, Qatar and Miami the obvious targets.
But perhaps the most unexpected answer comes when he's asked about the fitness habit he never skips. "Does sleeping count as a fitness habit? Prioritising sleep. Getting myself in the right environment." For someone who admits he struggles naturally with sleep - jet lag, pressure, the noise of city hotels - it's clearly a discipline in itself.
F1 is the new catwalk
The pit lane became a cat walk at Silverstone
Silverstone played host to something genuinely unprecedented at this year's British Grand Prix: the first ever pitlane fashion show. M&S staged their 'Dress to Thrill' activation on Media Day, turning the pit lane into a catwalk for 50 models, with the Williams garage as the backdrop.
Retail Gazette were there to cover it, speaking to M&S marketing director Sharry Cramond about the thinking behind the moment. "F1 is the new catwalk," she said, "and when we saw the opportunity to stage a fashion show on the pit lane, we knew it was a chance to create something truly original. The British Grand Prix is all about adrenaline, excitement and wow - and we wanted to bring that same energy to fashion."
The 'Dress to Thrill' collection included pieces from M&S's collaboration with Atlassian Williams F1 Team. For Cramond, the partnership was a natural one: "As two great British brands with global reach, there was a natural fit between M&S and Silverstone." The collection is available online and in store now.
Can F1 embrace AI?
Russell Paddon speaks with Carlos and Alex in Barcelona
Fast Company published a thoughtful piece this week asking exactly that question, and Williams featured prominently in the answer.
The article traces how AI is reshaping the way F1 teams work, from organising internal knowledge to accelerating engineering analysis. Central to the Williams section is Russell Paddon, our Driver Performance Engineer, who explained in detail how AI tools - across Atlassian's suite and through the team's partnership with Claude - have changed the pace of his work.
"Often, time is our biggest enemy in Formula 1 because the season moves on so quickly," he said. "We're always struggling to stay ahead of the curve, and in between races, trying to learn from the last weekend and take it forward to the following weekend is really quite important. That's where AI has kind of shortened that timeframe."
Paddon was candid about what the shift has meant in practice. A significant chunk of his time had previously been eaten up writing scripts to access and process data. "A lot of my time was previously spent either having to code and write tools to be able to answer some questions - I'd spend probably 60% of the time actually trying to do that and get the data I was interested in, not really adding value to the team." That overhead, he says, has almost entirely disappeared, leaving him free to focus on what the data actually means for the driver and the car.
Your ticket to Fan Appreciation
Climb the WClub tiers, earn Champion status and secure Fan Appreciation 2026 access!
Check your tier
WClub Exclusive
Carlos and the Netflix effect
The Cannes Lions coverage continued to land this week, with Axios publishing a write-up of Carlos' appearance at their Axios House event. The piece put the numbers in context: F1's fanbase has grown 63% since 2018, the year before Drive to Survive first aired.
He recalled the calculation he made early on about giving Netflix access: "I said, look, this could be game-changing, so let's give Netflix access, at least the first year until we see how this pans out." The 500,000 followers gained in the two weeks after the first series dropped made the answer clear.
Since then, he has watched Austin transform from a quietly attended race to something almost unrecognisable. "I lived through experiencing going to Austin and maybe not seeing that many fans," he said, "and then suddenly two years after COVID going to Austin and finding an insane amount of people there."
Jade on her rookie year
Over at DIVEBOMB, Williams F1 Team Driver Academy member Jade Jacquet sat down for an honest conversation about life in her debut F1 Academy season. She spoke openly about the steep learning curve, particularly the season-opening Shanghai round, where the shift between on-track focus and media duties caught her off guard.
"The most difficult part is to switch on - OK you need to focus on the driving, and after you need to smile to the camera even if you had a bad session," she said. "That was, in Shanghai, the most difficult thing for me."
She also reflected on a frustrating moment in Montreal, where a five-second pit lane penalty dropped her from sixth to twelfth after she had shown genuine pace. "Those moments are frustrating because the results don't show the pace that you had. But you just have to keep your head down and focus on the next one."
Away from the race weekends, Jade spoke warmly about the simulator work she does with the Williams, crediting it with helping her develop significantly as a driver, and named Jamie Chadwick as a key source of guidance and support.
Our partnership behind the scenes
TechRadar ran an interesting piece this week off the back of Silverstone, speaking to Atlassian's Customer CTO Andrew Boyagi about what the partnership is actually delivering inside Grove.
Baseline data taken between October 2025 and March 2026 found that 92% of the team now say they're working on the right organisational priorities, and after adopting Atlassian's AI tool Rovo, 63% say they have more time for strategic, innovative work, having delegated the repetitive, low-value tasks to AI.
Trust in documentation has also risen 200% in that period, significant in a sport where being able to find the right information, at the right moment, is a genuine competitive advantage. New tools like a fault management system are now monitoring for conflict and repetition when mechanics report issues from the track or factory.
"Success in Formula 1 is about good technology and good teamwork," Boyagi said, "but it is always a sport where luck comes into it as well."
Shop our latest arrivals:
Limited Edition
AWF1 Team x Marvel - Iron Man: Racing Towards Doom Monaco Special Edition Cover
···
2026 Lifestyle Traditional Cord Cap
···
2026 Lifestyle Traditional Trucker Cap
···
2026 Traditional Washed Cap 9TWENTY
···
2026 Lifestyle Animal Cap
···
2026 Lifestyle Animal Bucket Hat
···
Latest
Related Tags
Trending
© 2026 The Williams Group, under licence to Williams IP Holdings LLC
Williams Grand Prix Engineering Services LLP, a limited liability partnership registered in England and Wales with company registration number OC456938 and whose registered address is at Station Road, Grove, Wantage, Oxfordshire, OX12 0DQ.
Powered By