Karun Chandhok’s top Williams F1 cars

Over the past 20 years, I’ve driven 34 different Formula 1 cars in total, including 14 world championship winners and one from every decade from the pre-war 1937 Aston Martin to Lewis Hamilton’s title-winning 2019 Mercedes. But the moments I savour feature Williams.

Back in 2016, my friend Jonathan Williams was looking to formalise the Heritage division, sitting within the F1 team carrying his family name. His father was never one for sentimentality and generally always looked forward, but Jonathan is a romantic F1 fan like me and we would spend hours reminiscing about stories from the 1980s and 1990s. So when he asked if I would get involved with Williams Heritage, the answer was easy.

My role primarily involves testing the cars that have been restored by the Heritage team, either for private clients or cars still owned by the team. There are obviously promotional and demonstration runs like Goodwood that pop up, but my favourite days are spent at a quiet track with the team and clients where we get to truly enjoy these cars as pure pieces of racing history. When Dorilton took over as the owner of the team and therefore also the owner of the Heritage car collection, I was a bit worried it wouldn’t embrace the history of the team. Fortunately, Dorilton has recognised the significance of the history of the team, not just to F1 but to the fanbase.

The Heritage division is now led by former racing driver Jonathan Kennard and does an incredible job of building the cars exactly as they would have been in period. The car restoration process is overseen by Jim Barker, who has been at Williams for more than 30 years, and we have a team of mechanics and engineers who generally all worked on these cars in period.

The team has also created an excellent digital archive of all the run sheets, set-up sheets and engineering drawings from over the years so we can go back to them for reference as and when it’s needed to either rebuild or run a car. For example, just last week I was shaking down an FW11 from 1986 and we ran it with exactly the same set-up as Nigel Mansell had when he won at Brands Hatch in that car.

It would be easier to run the car if we replaced the original dashboard and electronics with modern systems, but that wouldn’t be right from a historical perspective. Somehow the brilliant engineers at Heritage can get the original active suspension working beautifully on a 1992 title-winning FW14B despite the software for that being written in-house and not even using something as modern as Windows!

The reason this is possible is really down to passion which runs deep within everyone involved at Heritage. This extends to our friends from the engine suppliers – Honda, Renault or BMW. Their faces light up when they hear and see the car come alive as it floods the memory bank of the glory days of the past. Every time I sit in the cockpit, blip the throttle and see that reaction, it reminds me why preserving the history and igniting interest is of fundamental importance to the world of Formula 1.

FW14B

Back in 2017, we were celebrating the 40th anniversary of the team and an amazing opportunity presented itself for me to do a celebratory demonstration with the FW14B before the British Grand Prix. The late 1980s and early 1990s was the era when I fell in love with F1, so to drive the most iconic Williams from that era, at Silverstone, in front of the crowd was amazing. The images of Mansell sending the crowds into a frenzy and the voice of Murray Walker kept flashing through my head as I powered down Hangar Straight.

Over the years, I’ve been fortunate to spend time talking about the FW14B with Nigel, Patrick Head, Adrian Newey and Paddy Lowe, which has helped me understand and appreciate just how this icon was born.

Feeling the active suspension work is fascinating. You have to get used to the movement but it’s so beautifully balanced. The Renault V10 still produces over 700bhp in a car weighing just 580kg (with driver!). It feels sensational. The driveability was amazing and the sound took me straight back to being an eight-year-old.

FW08C

In 1983, Keke Rosberg delivered a masterclass in Monaco, powersliding to victory on slicks on a damp track. To celebrate 35 years since that win, we took the FW08C back to Monaco for the Historique weekend. I have raced at Monaco in four different categories, but driving something with a manual gearbox and from an era where you felt much more exposed in the cockpit was a very different experience.

The whole line of FW07s into FW08s are brilliant, user-friendly cars. The 08C was the shorter wheelbase car introduced for 1983 after the ground-effect skirts were banned as a part of the whole political war within F1 in that era. Williams didn’t really have a chance to fight for the title without a turbo engine that year, but the car is great fun to drive. Small, light and agile, the driveability of the Cosworth DFV allied to a brilliant gearbox is surprisingly easy to use and throw around. Driving it around Monaco was amazing.

FW26

In my opinion, 2004 was the peak of F1 performance. The cars were so powerful with over 950bhp (only a fraction less than today’s cars) weighed only 605kg (nearly 200kg less than now) with good downforce and a tyre war which made cornering speeds impressive.

I’ve driven the FW26 which won the final race of 2004 with Juan Pablo Montoya and it truly was an awe-inspiring experience. I do believe that when a driver goes from F2 or any other category to F1, those first few laps need to shock them into thinking ‘this is just terrifyingly awesome’. With the weight of the modern cars, the overall driving experience is a more benign one as the cars are fundamentally less agile. The first few laps I did in the FW26 at Silverstone were a brutal attack on my senses. The extraordinary noise of the BMW V10 engine revving to 19,500rpm is the cherry on top.

FW08B

One of the great things about F1 in the 1970s and 1980s was the freedom for creativity. Unlike today, teams had the ability to think outside the box, leading to innovations like ground effects, turbo engines as well as a mix of V8s, V10s and V12s, carbon fibre chassis, semi-auto gearboxes and active suspension.

There isn’t much that highlights this era of innovation more than the six-wheeled F1 cars. The Tyrrell, of course, was the first and achieved some success, but the unraced Williams FW08B would have completely transformed the sport had it been allowed to race. I love driving the six-wheeler, simply because it is just so different and is an incredible ‘what if’ story in the history of F1.

Obviously it has incredible traction because of the four-wheel drive system, all driven from the rear, and improved downforce as a result of a longer floor area, but the hidden benefit of reduced drag from smaller rear tyres is hugely significant. The first time I drove the car at Thruxton, we didn’t have the ride height set correctly and it was producing so much suction effect that the skirts dragged around the track and left two distinct lines all the way around the asphalt!

The only negative was the increased weight at the rear of the car, but I remember Patrick Head telling me that they already had plans to redesign the rear suspension and take a huge amount of weight out of the car if the programme continued. Alas, F1 politics got involved and the car never raced, so I feel very privileged to experience driving that unique piece of F1 history from time to time.

BT26

Not technically a Williams car, but in 2019, to celebrate Frank’s 50th year in F1, Jonathan worked with the team at the ROFGO Collection to restore the Brabham BT26 in which Piers Courage finished second in the Monaco Grand Prix. This was when Frank entered the car under the Frank Williams Racing Cars name.

The whole restoration was kept as a secret from Frank. We took the car to Silverstone and had it in the pits, looking fantastic, when Frank pulled up. As he came into the garage in his wheelchair, his face absolutely lit up, which was just wonderful to see. Frank had a reputation of not being particularly emotional but there was no doubt that his passion for racing ran deep and that moment where he remembered where it all started for him brought it to the fore.

It was a miserably wet day, but with all three of Frank’s children and his grandchildren watching, there was no way I was going to let the weather dampen the mood. It was an emotional and special day for the whole Williams family. Seeing the pride on their faces as they stood around Frank when I pulled into the pits is something I’ll never forget.