James Vowles: ‘We know what it takes’

Our Team Principal reveals how preparations are progressing ahead of next season

Published

03 FEB 2026

Est. reading time

5 min

The new Formula 1 season is almost upon us – and James Vowles is excited by what lies in store for Atlassian Williams F1 Team.

Our Team Principal can reflect on plenty of progress across the 2025 campaign, but will have aspirations of continued improvement over the year ahead.

However, it is difficult to assess next term with too much certainty, as a new set of regulations looks set to make 2026 somewhat unpredictable.

James is relishing that prospect, though, as he revealed when discussing his hopes for what promises to be an enthralling season.

“2025 was an exceptional year, but it gives us now a baseline to work from and to grow from both in terms of performance and in terms of infrastructure and systems,” he explained.

“I’m excited because these regulations, I think, are going to be brilliant. I think we're going to get some interesting racing.

“It's thrown the performance order, and it will shake it up I'm sure, to a certain extent. It's unpredictable for everyone, including teams.

“So I’m excited because I can still see the continuous growth pushing through, that's been there for the last few years.

“But 2026 isn't the finished article [for Williams]. It's a long way from the finished article. Across the business, I can see areas that are absolutely moving forward and at pace, but not championship level.

“And we have to be realistic about that. There's some fierce competition out there and we know what it takes.

“I know what it takes and a number of us know what it takes – we know what it takes to win championships. We're not there, but we are moving the right way towards it.”

The FW48 livery has been revealed

James also expanded on what steps are being taken to keep the team heading in the right direction, as preparations for the first race of 2026 continue apace – from technological developments to new partners.

“[In terms of changes] There are some sort of big, juicy items, like our full state-of-the-art Driver in Loop simulator, that was used and signed off just at the end of 2025,” he said.

“And that's a huge step in our journey – simulation tools that really are a benchmark, that allow us now not to just use heuristic knowledge in order to build the car and design where we're going, but proper tool sets that allow us to understand what a future vision can look like and [be] implemented at the same time.

“But we're not at the end of that journey yet. There's still a huge amount of work to do in order to get them working as efficiently as possible.

“We have investment in our site, we have investments in people, we have great leaders joining us from all over the grid and all over the world at the same time.

Available now

2026 FW48

“I think on-track success is one way to gauge how well we're doing, and 2025 was a culmination of that. But that isn't the only area that we have been rebuilding from the ground up.

“The commercial team really has been rebuilt from the ground up, working in a very different way with state-of-the-art methods and systems.

“And the outcome that we have had across this winter is exceptional. This is by far the biggest, last three or four months for our commercial teams and marketing teams. And they've done a brilliant, brilliant job.

“I'm proud to wear the shirt that has many of our partners listed who want to be part of our journey. A lot of our partners share our same vision.

“They know we're not the final finished product, but they can see that the path we're on is one that's really exciting. It's a huge transformation [from the] bottom up, no shortcuts.

Watch Now: The FW48 livery is revealed

“Doing things properly towards the end goal of winning championships – and that is an attractive proposition for companies that perhaps even themselves, are in a similar transformation, or believe and understand what the journey is.

“We have such a strong legacy in Williams, and we’re combining that with partners that not just want themselves to be connected with us, but more importantly for me, want them to be a key part of this transformation.

“So many of the partners we've signed are actively going to make a huge difference to how we change over the next 12-24 months and beyond.”

Drivers Alex Albon and Carlos Sainz are clearly a key part of the team’s ongoing transformation – and James continues to be enthused by the prospects of such an exciting pairing.

“I've said it before, I'll keep saying it again – it's a very strong line-up,” the 46-year-old said.

“It's a line-up that means we’re certainly not limited by drivers, we’re limited by what car we can produce for the two of them. And that's how it should be.

“In terms of what it means: When you have a regulation change, you need to very quickly be agile, react on track and understand what you're doing.

“You need to be very good at working with the engineering teams and the drivers to optimise all of that.

“We have two really strong drivers. They won't have to be learning themselves and they'll be driving the team forward at the same time.

“More so than that, I’ve said this many times, but I'll reiterate it – they are leaders in their own right and they're very good at bringing the team on the journey of where we need to be for championship level.

“They both have experience of being at podium or winning level and they know, therefore, what the gaps are and how to bring us correctly, in the right words, on that journey at the same time.

“A key thing with the 2026 cars is that the workload of the driver goes up. I think that's a good thing.

“I think it rewards teams like ourselves where with Alex and Carlos, the driving is very instinctive and natural, and they have the brain capacity to be able to deal with how to use their electrical energy in the most efficient way possible, for example.

“Also things like how to race while still focusing on the basics of the tyres, the systems, the track, etc.

“And I think it will very much reward our two drivers in those circumstances, and give us a little bit of a leg up.”

Official 2026 Team Kit

Related Tags

Trending

Shop