Five times our car had a personal touch

In Austin, our FW44 will proudly be running the names of 44 Williams Racing fans across the entire United States Grand Prix weekend and there’s still time for your name to be one of them.

Our competition ends this Sunday, so head there sharpish to make sure your name is in the draw.

This did get us thinking about the other times our Formula One cars have had a slightly more personal touch.

Here are five times we had a bespoke decal to our racing machines.

At the 2021 Monaco Grand Prix, we became only the third Formula One team to have entered 750 Grands Prix.

To celebrate, we invited fans to calculate how many races they had been a Williams Racing fan for before 100 lucky winners would have their name featured on our FW43B’s halo as we took the streets.

It was incredible to learn all the amazing stories from supporters of what Williams meant to them.

The 2016 Brazilian Grand Prix was set to be Felipe Massa’s final home race and the team prepared a special tribute that was befitting of the 11-time race winner's career.

‘Massa’ replaced our sponsor's branding on the FW38’s engine cover, whilst ‘Obrigado’ was written across the rear wing.

Felipe Baby was making good progress from his P13 qualifying effort, before agonisingly crashing out but what followed were scenes that displayed the true spirit of Formula One.

As the Brazilian walked down the pit lane, mechanics from up and down the grid spontaneously formed a guard of honour – there wasn’t a dry eye in the house.

He didn’t know it at the time, but Felipe would get one final home race the following season, finishing a solid P7 in Interlagos.

The 2001 season hadn’t quite started the way we would have wanted and quite frankly, the team were tired of being rear-ended by other drivers on track.

Ralf Schumacher had been hit by the Ferrari of Rubens Barrichello in both Malaysia and Brazil whilst Juan Pablo Montoya was infamously taken out of the lead in Brazil by Jos Verstappen in the Arrows.

Something needed to be done and the team decided to issue a warning: Keep your distance!

The warning was debuted in Free Practice at the San Marino Grand Prix in Imola, and it seemed like the drivers got the message – Ralf jumped into the lead at the start and never looked back, passing the chequered in P1.

With the 2022 Canadian Grand Prix taking place on Father's Day, Williams Racing and our partners at Duracell wanted to take the opportunity to celebrate fathers who power their kids through the moments that matter most.

So, we asked fans to send in their stories about their inspirational dads with the chance to win a once-in-a-lifetime race weekend experience…

We found Cristian Escobar, who was described by his son Gabriel as “my dad, my hero and my friend.”

Cristian’s surprise Father’s Day gift from Gabriel was to have his name displayed on the side of our cars on race day, written by Alex Albon and Nicholas Latifi themselves.

Following the sad news of Sir Frank Williams’ passing, the team wanted to pay tribute to our legendary founder at the very next race.

On our halo, we ran a quote that Sir Frank lived his life by: “I feel the need, the need for speed”.

Flanking either side of the message was the logo of the Frank Williams Racing Cars team, a design we also featured on our sidepods.

Every team throughout the paddock also ran the logo in remembrance of the sports longest serving team principal, showcasing the respect he had gained in this sport we all love.