Williams’ 7 greatest moments in Formula 1

After a decade or so in the doldrums, Williams, now under the leadership of team principal James Vowles, is enjoying something of a renaissance with drivers Alex Albon and Carlos Sainz Jr., and fans all over the world will be very much hoping that we’re on the verge of a return to winning ways.

Williams hasn’t stood on the top step of the podium since Pastor Maldonado’s remarkable victory at Barcelona in 2012, but the team enjoyed nearly 30 years of success throughout the 1980s, ‘90s and 2000s. Many of those will be recognised during the 2025 Festival of Speed presented by Mastercard, with Nigel Mansell set to climb into his 1992 Championship-winning Williams FW14B as part of Goodwood’s F1 75 celebrations. Here are some of the Williams team’s greatest F1 moments.

The first World Championships

Williams’ rise in F1 was meteoric. After finishing as runner-up in the Constructors’ Championship at just the third attempt, the team went one better in 1980. With the new FW07B, Australian Alan Jones took five Grand Prix victories and five further podiums to claim the Drivers’ Championship. His team-mate Carlos Reutemann was also quick, winning once and claiming another seven podiums to carry Williams to a dominant title double.

Williams had avoided the radical rethink embarked on by Team Lotus with the doomed Lotus 80 project and instead focussed on developing the FW07 into the FW07B, which boasted 30 per cent more downforce than its predecessor.

The Championship got off to a flyer. Jones took victory at the season-opening Argentine Grand Prix on a track that more closely emulated a Tarmac rally stage than an F1 racetrack; the surface was torn to shreds by a combination of excessive heat and the massive downforce of the ground effect cars. It was a race of attrition, but Jones had the car underneath him to take the win.

From there, he would be embroiled in a season-long battle for the Title with Brabham’s Nelson Piquet, but Williams' relentless development during the season saw the Australian come out on top. The prowess of Patrick Head and chief aerodynamicist Frank Dernie conspired to create a car that was quicker and more reliable that the opposition. The Williams DFV engine was sent for a dusting of John Judd's engineering magic and fitted with advanced camshafts and cylinder heads to extract more power than Cosworth could from its own engine.  

It was that impressive work by the Williams team that kept Jones in Title contention, and by the final round of the season it was he who held a near unassailable eight-point lead at the top of the Championship.

Jones proved his ability with a vintage drive at the season's final race at Watkins Glen. Coming off the track at the start of the race, he dropped from second to 16^th before storming through the field to win ahead of team-mate Reutemann to finish the season in style.

Nigel Mansell's win at Brands Hatch

But while Alan Jones drove Williams to its first World Championships, it was another driver who would become synonymous with the team. Nigel Mansell became a Williams driver for the first time in 1985, and didn’t have to wait long for his first victory with the team.

His status at the team was immortalised almost immediately after his car number ‘5’ was coloured red to help distinguish him from his team-mate Keke Rosberg. As ‘Red 5’, Mansell set about forging a legacy as one of the great Williams drivers. That road began at that year’s European Grand Prix at Brands Hatch.

Qualifying third behind Ayrton Senna and Rosberg, the fast-starting Mansell overtook the Fin only to put a wheel on the grass and fall back to fourth position. But chaos ahead brought Mansell back into contention. Rosberg was forced into a spin by Senna and collected by Piquet in the aftermath. Rosberg, who blamed Senna for ruining his race, found himself in front of the leaders as he rejoined the race and in a perfect position to inflict vengeance. The Fin blocked Senna, allowing Mansell to sneak past the two of them while keeping Senna behind to help Mansell build a lead.

From there, Manswell went on to claim a hugely popular victory for Williams, to the joy of the British crowd. This was the day Mansell Mania was born.

The duel in Northamptonshire

Williams was always going to win the 1987 British Grand Prix after the team dominated qualifying, but the question was: which Williams?

Nelson Piquet was odds-on favourite after he out-qualified his team-mate, but with a crowd of more than 100,000 adoring fans willing him to victory, you'd dismiss Mansell at your peril. The race got underway as expected, with Piquet leading a Williams duel. By lap 35, the gap was around two seconds when Mansell opted to throw the dice and pit for fresh tyres, while Piquet opted to go it on a single set. 

Mansell emerged almost 30 seconds behind the leader, and what followed would become etched in British racing folklore as Red 5 reeled in the leader. He broke the lap record eight times in the process of catching back up to his team-mate and Championship nemesis, eventually passing him with a dramatic move at Stowe corner with two laps to go.

The stress of the relentless chase caused Mansell’s engine to fail on the cool-down lap, leaving him stranded and swamped by fans who had made their way onto the track. They were legendary scenes, as a motorsport hero was engulfed by the British public.

Mansell is World Champion

Nigel Mansell's career peaked in 1992. At the wheel of the game-changing Williams FW14B, he won the first five races of the season to take a commanding lead in the Drivers’ Championship that he would never relinquish. It was unprecedented dominance from a driver-team pairing. Mansell took nine victories in all, setting a record that stood until Michael Schumacher surpassed it in 2002. He also took 14 pole positions and won the Title at the Hungarian Grand Prix with five races to spare.

Williams’ performance, particularly at the beginning of the season, was remarkable. Mansell led home his team-mate Ricardo Patrese at four of the first five races before the team was beaten for the first time by Ayrton Senna at the Monaco Grand Prix, which finished famously with Mansell battling furiously, but unsuccessfully, to find a way past.

Three further victories at the French, British and German Grands Prix left Mansell needing only to finish second in Hungary to seal the title. It was a typical performance by the man who drove Red 5, and he put in a brilliantly feisty drive in the face of several dramatic moments to take the points he needed to become the 1992 World Champion.

Damon Hill finally takes the title

The 1996 season saw Williams move from its Didcot birthplace to its current location of Grove in Oxfordshire, but if the location of the company HQ had changed, its knack for winning races certainly hadn't. Damon Hill had carried the team through a tough period in 1994, and fallen painfully short of the Championship, before a disappointing campaign in 1995 put his position at Williams under significant pressure. He simply had to win in 1996. 

The FW18 continued the impressive trend of Williams producing the best car on the grid that had continued for much of the 1990s, and it really was a fight between Hill and his team-mate Jacques Villeneuve as to who would claim the title. Powered by the superior Renault V10 with aerodynamics drawn up by Adrian Newey, it was by far and away the fastest car in 1996, and much like in 1992 it was Hill who made the best start, winning four of the first five races to take the advantage in the Championship.

A gut-wrenching retirement from the lead in Monaco was followed by a disastrous outing at the Spanish Grand Prix as he spun several times before a final excursion saw his race end in the wall, but that was as bad as it got for Hill. He steadied the ship with further victories at the Canadian and French Grands Prix. 

Villeneuve continued to pile on the pressure, though, and the Title battle ultimately went down to the final race of the season at Suzuka. Hill knew Villeneuve had to complete a ten-point swing to steal the title, so all he had to do was finish in the top six to ensure the gap at the top was insurmountable. But rather than drive cautiously and secure the necessary points, Hill put on a gutsy performance to overtake his Title rival and drive into an impressive and hugely emotional win. Murray Walker’s commentary as Hill took the chequered flag is legendary, and it was a moment that will be forever ingrained in F1 folklore.

Montoya’s stunning win at Monaco

Despite having won nine Constructors’ Championships, Williams had only managed to win the Monaco Grand Prix twice, way back in 1980 with Carlos Reutemann, and 1983 with Keke Rosberg. By 2003, it had been a full 20 years since the team had stood at the top of those famous Monaco steps.

Juan Pablo Montoya was on hand to right that wrong. That season’s Monaco Grand Prix is infamous as the first F1 history to have zero on-track overtakes after the first lap, a record it has since shared with five other races since. Montoya qualified third on the grid but slipped past Kimi Räikkönen on the run to turn one, and completed a remarkable overcut on pole-sitter Ralf Schumacher to claim the lead of the race on lap 23.

Michael Schumacher was attempting to finish the race with a single pit stop, and was in line to claim victory, but he was ultimately forced to stop again, rejoining in third position behind Montoya and Räikkönen. There was almost nothing between the three front runners, but Monaco's unique nature meant Montoya crossed the line with barely a cigarette paper between himself, Schumacher and Räikkönen. 

Maldonado stuns the world

By 2012, Williams' had suffered a relative downturn in form since the departure of BMW at the end of 2005. Its last race victory had come at the Brazilian Grand Prix in 2004, and Williams had fallen to ninth in the Constructors’ Championship in 2011. That disappointing run of form continued through the early stages of the 2012 season, so nobody could quite believe their eyes when Pastor Maldonado stuck the FW34 on pole for that season’s Spanish Grand Prix. 

There was an element of luck involved, as quickest driver Lewis Hamilton was excluded from qualifying, but Maldonado had been quickest in Q2 and was well deserving of his first and only pole position. Even then, the thought of Williams winning in Spain was scarcely believable, and Maldonado’s challenging start threatened to bring us all back down to earth.

The Williams car was genuinely fast, though, and Maldonado remained in the hunt for victory with consistent speed. He eventually made it pay to retake the lead during the first round of pit stops and emerged from his second stop behind Kimi Räikkönen, but on fresher tyres he quickly dispatched the Finn within two laps.

From there it was a tense race to the finish as both Maldonado and Alonso battled to conserve their tyres while also fighting for the win. The Williams driver held on to take his first and only Grand Prix victory in incredible fashion, breaking his team’s duck and returning Williams to the top step of the podium. To this day, Maldonado’s success remains the team’s last F1 victory.

The 2025 Festival of Speed takes place on 10th-13th July. Friday and Saturday tickets are now sold out, but Thursday and limited Sunday tickets are still available.

Images courtesy of Getty Images.