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The world of Formula 1 is filled with larger-than-life legacies, however, there is one whose impact cannot be overstated. The passing of the longest-serving team principal in the sport united F1 once again, during a season that has seen more than its share of divisive competition.
Francis ‘Frank’ Owen Garbutt Williams was born on April 16, 1942 and died on Sunday, aged 79. His passing in many ways symbolised the end of an era in F1 and came a year after the Williams family sold their eponymous team to a private equity firm, effectively severing their ties with the sport.
Before the road accident that changed his life at the age of 43, Frank Williams epitomised the breed of fast-living men who had graduated from amateur post-war British motor racing to dominate the sport at its highest level.
He skirted death, but tetraplegia was no match for a man devoted to winning, often against the odds. He went on to add seven more constructors’ world championships and five more drivers’ titles to his belt before being knighted for his services to motor sport.
Soon, his wheelchair became a familiar sight at the world’s racing circuits. Williams sat in the pits during the races and qualifying sessions, watching the computer screens that monitored his cars’ progress, his once expressive features now a largely inscrutable mask.
His rival team bosses’ fears were summed up by Ron Dennis of McLaren, who said, when it was announced that Williams would be returning: “Now he’s even more dangerous. All he can do with his time is think.”
Once Williams had returned from his accident, he led a team producing a stream of cutting edge cars filled with innovations, allowing Nigel Mansell to become the first to win nine races in a single season.
The Williams team was soon the one every driver wanted to join. In 1994, Ayrton Senna switched over from McLaren. The Brazilian was leading his third race in the FW16, at Imola, when he was killed. It would be several years, and a wringing through the Italian legal system, before Williams and Head were cleared of blame for an accident that forced F1 to reconsider its attitude to safety.
Jacques Villeneuve’s 1997 title would prove to be Williams’ last. The team lost key team members and gradually declined, although engineering collaborations with Renault, BMW and others bolstered the company’s finances. In August last year he bowed to the inevitable and sold the team to a US investment firm, Dorilton Capital, for $152 million.
Williams is survived by three children, Jonathan, Claire and Jamie, and two grandchildren, Ralph and Nathaniel.
