From Williams team
Sam Michael, Technical Director of the AT&T Williams [link artid+"127982"]Formula 1[/link] teams talks about the KERS, winter testing, rookie driver Pastor Maldonado and the new Pirelli tires.
Q: How has winter testing gone and how confident are you in the design of the FW33?
Sam Michael: We had a few reliability problems during winter testing but none of the problems we had were major, except perhaps those on KERS that have now been addressed. Some small faults caused some downtime, but that is the result of having such tightly integrated systems on F1 cars now. Encouragingly, we haven’t had any issues with the new conceptual areas that we pushed the boundaries on, like the driveshafts. We have successfully completed 4969.2 kilometres during winter testing.
Q: What about the performance of the FW33?
Sam Michael: The teams are closer now as a result of the new regulations, which is what they were designed to do. There are a lot of cars within half a second of each other which means if you bring two or three tenths, either from an aero upgrade or some other mechanical component, it could make a significant difference this year. The FW33 has been a good car from the beginning, but in terms of performance we will have to wait until the racing to really see where it stands.
Sam Michael, Technical Director of the AT&T Williams [link artid+"127982"]Formula 1[/link] teams talks about the KERS, winter testing, rookie driver Pastor Maldonado and the new Pirelli tires.
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| Sam Michael (photo: Williams) |
Q: How has winter testing gone and how confident are you in the design of the FW33?
Sam Michael: We had a few reliability problems during winter testing but none of the problems we had were major, except perhaps those on KERS that have now been addressed. Some small faults caused some downtime, but that is the result of having such tightly integrated systems on F1 cars now. Encouragingly, we haven’t had any issues with the new conceptual areas that we pushed the boundaries on, like the driveshafts. We have successfully completed 4969.2 kilometres during winter testing.
Q: What about the performance of the FW33?
Sam Michael: The teams are closer now as a result of the new regulations, which is what they were designed to do. There are a lot of cars within half a second of each other which means if you bring two or three tenths, either from an aero upgrade or some other mechanical component, it could make a significant difference this year. The FW33 has been a good car from the beginning, but in terms of performance we will have to wait until the racing to really see where it stands.
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| Photo: Williams |