The Williams team’s 2008 season race car, the Williams Toyota FW30, took to the track at the Valencia circuit in Southern Spain this morning for a shakedown prior to starting its winter testing tomorrow.
The team’s newly recruited test driver, Nico Hulkenberg, is taking on the responsibility of shaking down the new race car before regular race driver, Nico Rosberg and his team-mate, Kazuki Nakajima, share first assessments of the car from tomorrow onwards.
For its roll-out, the FW30 is liveried in the second of a campaign series of six designs celebrating Williams’ thirty years in Formula One. Reflecting the collegiate nature of Formula One, which requires a wide variety of technical and financial contributors, a committed and skilled workforce and the essential support of the viewing public, this week’s design communicates Williams’ thanks to its staff and its fans.
Every name of the current 519-member Williams workforce will be carried on the FW30-01 this week, and the company also thanks the 85 brands whose sponsorship identities have graced Williams race car liveries since January 15, 1978, when the Williams FW06 took to the track for the Argentine Grand Prix in the hands of Alan Jones. These sponsorship revenues have supported Williams’ purity of purpose as an independent racing organisation and the company is indebted to these commercial partners, past and present. The livery also reflects the team’s wish to thank the public at large for three decades of support and goodwill which has seen Williams develop a pre-eminent international sporting reputation.
The FW30 will be tested by Nico Rosberg on Tuesday and Wednesday with Kazuki Nakajima taking the wheel for the last day of the test. Next week, for the first test at the Circuit de Catalunya in Barcelona, the team will unveil the next in a series of livery messages prior to the team’s 2008 season racing colours being revealed for the Australian Grand Prix on March 16.
