Status: 11/28/2021 4:30 p.m.
Frank Williams was team boss in Formula 1 for many decades. Now he has died at the age of 79. He hasn’t been on the track for a long time. His once successful team is going through difficult times.
Frank Williams
Image: Alberto Pellaschiar / AP / dpa
Formula 1 mourns Frank Williams. The former team boss and co-owner of the traditional British racing team of the same name died on Sunday at the age of 79, as his family announced.
Until his official retirement in September 2020, he was the oldest team boss in Formula 1. He has not been in a race in the premier motorsport class for a long time. His health had deteriorated over the past few years. He was admitted to the hospital on Friday and died peacefully there on Sunday morning, the message said.
His daughter Claire, deputy team boss, has represented him on Grand Prix weekends for a long time. After the Italian Grand Prix in Monza 2020, the family withdrew from the racing team that had been sold to a US investor. An era came to an end. Frank Williams has been in a wheelchair since a car accident in 1986 on the way back from test drives in Le Castellet, France. Since then he has always had to be looked after.
His racing team won the drivers’ world championship seven times
Nico Rosberg, Ralf Schumacher, Nick Heidfeld and Nico Hülkenberg drove for his racing team. Legends like Nelson Piquet, Nigel Mansell and Alain Prost won titles in the Williams. Williams won the constructors ‘championship a total of nine times and the drivers’ championship seven times, most recently both in 1997. Williams celebrated 114 Grand Prix victories.
Frank Williams and the racing team, which he founded in 1977 with Patrick Head, experienced the blackest hour on May 1, 1994. The Brazilian Formula 1 icon Ayrton Senna died in Imola after an accident in a Williams car.
The British officer’s son Frank Williams was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1999. He was also honored by the Legion of Honor for his services in motorsport in collaboration with the French engine manufacturer Renault. Williams’ racing career began as a pilot in Formula 2 and Formula 3. In the past few years, the Williams team mostly only drove at the bottom of the field in Formula 1.
Source: sportschau.de