Formula 1 News: Sainz & Albon shake down the Williams FW47

Atlassian Williams Racing’s 2025 challenger, the FW47, made its on-track debut earlier today, successfully completing 200km at the Silverstone circuit. Alex Albon and Carlos Sainz shared driving duties, experiencing this year’s car for the first time.

The day began with a special live broadcast, streamed globally, where the team unveiled the FW47 and celebrated the team’s new title partnership with Atlassian. Williams welcomed partners, media and 47 loyal Williams fans from across the globe, who were selected from more than 17,000 competition entrants.

Atlassian appeared on the car for the first time in a one-off bespoke design, with the official 2025 race livery set to be revealed on 18th February at the F1 75 Live Launch at London’s O2 Arena. The partnership deal is the biggest in Williams’ 48-year history and demonstrates another vote of confidence for the team’s mission to return to the front of the grid.

Carlos Sainz took to the track at 10:05am, putting in his first lap in the FW47 livestreamed to the world. Despite typical cold and windy February conditions at Silverstone, Carlos successfully completed all his planned laps with no issues, before Alex took to the wheel for the session after lunch, enjoying some brief afternoon sun.

James Vowles, Team Principal: “The first run of the FW47 is the result of tens of thousands of hours of work and a moment of immense pride that symbolizes the progress we are making at Atlassian Williams Racing. We rolled out the car at the precise moment we said we would, on live television, with a formidable new driver line-up and a fantastic new title partner in Atlassian. There is a lot to look forward to in 2025 and I can’t wait to go racing next month.”

Dave Robson, Chief Engineer: “Today we launched the FW47 at Silverstone and had the opportunity to shakedown the new car and to check that the systems are behaving as intended.

Carlos and Alex shared the driving through the day, and between them were able to complete the permitted 200km without issue. The car ran well and, having completed a few careful laps to check that everything was working correctly, we were able to push the car hard and confirm that there were no major problems. Inevitably, we found a few very minor issues, but these will be quickly resolved before we arrive in Bahrain, and they didn’t affect the running today.

In the cold conditions, and using the Pirelli promotional tires, it is impossible to assess the performance of the FW47, however, the telemetry and driver feedback suggests that the basic characteristics of the car are very close to expectation and there are no immediate handling concerns.

We now have a few days to use the experience from today to finalize our testing plan for Bahrain. Now that we are confident that the car will run well, we are in a great position to maximize our time in Bahrain and to ensure that we arrive in Melbourne ready to start the 2025 season strongly.”

Carlos Sainz: “The first 100 kilometers in the FW47 are done and it has been a smooth day. We managed to complete all the run plan without any issues, and I got my first proper feeling for the car. It was a bold statement from Williams to show the first lap of this new car to our partners, the media, and our fans, and it went very well. Good job to everyone back at Grove – now we’re ready for the season to start.”

Alex Albon: “I’m really happy. Normally this weather makes the car feel good, and it did today. We won’t know for sure what the car is like until Bahrain, but the car was reliable, and we put on a great show for our partners and fans, so I hope everyone enjoyed that. Roll on Bahrain!”