Williams Hint at Key 2021 F1 Rule Change, Possibly Changing Team’s Fortunes

Williams have scored only eight points over the last three seasons in Formula 1. The British team is desperately looking for a comeback and the head of vehicle performance, Dave Robson thinks next year could be much better.

The 2021 Formula 1 rules have made some changes regarding the floor rules. FIA decided to cut downforce to lower the stress the tires have to go through. Robson believes that this change could be quite significant, and thus, expects some good news for the team next season.

“It is a major change to the floor, particularly that area close to the rear tyre. It is an area where we suspect we’re not class leader, let’s say, so hopefully for us it’s less of a hit than some of those other teams,” he explained.

Robson believes the change will have a lesser impact on Williams

The top teams in Formula 1 manage to exploit the floor designs far better than the bottom trawlers because of variability in resources. Therefore, top teams like Mercedes and Red Bull will stand to lose more from the rule change than Williams.

He said, “I think it is traditionally a very difficult area to understand, particularly how the floor will react to the tyre as it deforms and ages and wears. So hopefully it will have quite a big effect for the teams at the sharp end and perhaps less so for us.”

“That’s what we’re hoping and hopefully there’s some early indications from the running we did on Friday [in Abu Dhabi] that that might be the case,” Robson concluded.

George Russell has shown some promise, driving his Williams car to the limit. He has catapulted the car into Q2 several times and also came close to scoring at Imola. They will hope that the rule change will tilt fate in their direction and help them overcome the struggles of the last two years.