In the heart of rural England’s green and pleasant land, on the outskirts of the unassuming village of Grove, sits a shrine to speed. It is a long way from the glamouer of Monte Carlo and Abu Dhabi but the sprawling countryside headquarters of Williams Racing is the engine that drives one of motorsport’s most storied teams.
Williams is steeped in sporting history. It boasts an illustrious rollcall of Formula One icons, from Alain Prost to Nigel Mansell, Ayrton Senna to Damon Hill. Champions adorn the walls and halls of the team’s Oxfordshire HQ. Their original cars are displayed proudly in the on-site ‘experience centre’; part museum, part mausoleum – it is a place for retired vehicles to be suitably venerated.
One of the oldest cars in that room dates back almost four decades. The 1982 Williams FW08 was driven by Finland’s Keke Rosberg as he won his only drivers’ championships and the second of seven for the Williams team. Thirty-four years later his son Nico – whose F1 career began at Williams – famously emulated him, albeit in a Mercedes.
But those glory days of Rosberg, Hill, Mansell and Co. feel a world away. The celebration of myriad past successes provides a stark reminder of how difficult life has been for Williams in more recent memory. Venezuelan Pastor Maldonado’s victory in Spain in 2012 is Williams’ only Grand Prix win of the past 17 years. There have been some promising seasons but far too many fallow years for a team that remains the second-most successful ever to race in Formula One.
“For people who aren’t brand new to the sport, Williams still have that pull and heritage – they are one of Formula One’s most romantic teams,” explains Chris Medland, a journalist who has travelled the world with the F1 press pack for more than a decade. “If you were to make a football comparison it would be like Manchester United – they have not been successful for a while but are still a huge name that many fans root for.”
Like United, Williams enjoys a strong level of support in the Middle East. It might surprise many but the relationship between Williams and the region is one that stretches back almost to the company’s inception.
When founders Frank Williams and Patrick Head were struggling to finance their embryonic racing team in the later 1970s, they turned to the Gulf for help. Friends and funds were found in Saudi Arabia and long before Emirates entered the realm of sporting sponsorship, Saudia airline and Al-Bilad Hotels found themselves on the livery of a Formula One car.
When Williams won its first ever constructors’ championship in 1980, the Saudi flag flew alongside the Union Jack above the pitlane. And when Keke Rosberg won in 1982, the words ‘Fly Saudia’ had pride of place on his rear wing.
Today Williams is no longer a family-owned business, with Frank selling the team to New York investment company Dorliton Capital in August 2020. But in a welcome piece of sporting synergy, as Williams lines up on the grid for the inaugural Saudi Arabian Grand Prix in Jeddah this month, the connections with the region do not end there.
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In the paddock at Brazil’s Interlagos circuit, Nicholas Latifi is preparing for another race weekend. Mechanics work busily behind him, trying to make his car as competitive as possible for the impending Sao Paulo Grand Prix. The whirring of tools muffles a couple of answers but the affable Canadian racer kindly checks each time that he is still audible.
Latifi is half Iranian. His father Mehrdad (now known as Michael) was born in Tehran but fled to the United States during the revolution, before joining siblings in Canada and eventually building a food manufacturing business empire. He is now a multi-millionaire investor and philanthropist but to Nicholas, he is just ‘dad’.
“My father was my hero and idol growing up.” Latifi tells Esquire Middle East. “He was forced to leave Iran at a young age and has never been back. I have never been either.”
Latifi Sr. worked three jobs, including at McDonald’s, to put himself through university and instilled a strong work ethic in Nicholas, his sister and two brothers.
“All the hardships he had to overcome and perseverance he has shown along the way have inspired me. He has been a great role model to have. I’m in a completely different walk of life but for high performers – whether in sport or business or arts – there are things that overlap in terms of personal qualities.”
When Latifi was announced as Williams’ new driver for the 2020 F1 season, his surname sparked some frantic Googling by Middle Eastern sports fans the world over. The 26-year-old has since found his regional fanbase building.
“I know my name is quite common in Iran and I have received lots of messages from Latifis – maybe some are distant cousins,” he laughs. “I’ve had a lot of support from Iran and other countries around the Middle East too. It is cool to be representing the region.”
Latifi is also representing a Formula One team with immense history, standing on the shoulders of some giants of motorsport. It is not a position he takes lightly. “From the first moments of going around the factory, the history of the team really resonated. You almost have to pinch yourself thinking about the drivers and cars that have come before.
“Williams has not been in the strongest position in recent years but it doesn’t take away from the buzz, excitement and privilege I feel to race for this team.”
The media spotlight has been stolen somewhat in recent days by fellow Williams driver George Russell, after it was announced the Brit would be moving to Mercedes to race alongside Lewis Hamilton in the 2022 season. In Russell’s place will come another fresh-faced driver in 25-year-old Alex Albon.
“Williams have a great record of giving young drivers opportunities at the start of their career,” Latifi explains. “I’m one of them, George is one of them. Not just driving, new engineering talent too. Williams give people those chances.”
Among those given their start in F1 by Williams were 2016 world champ Nico Rosberg and last season’s runner-up Valtteri Bottas. Latifi is aiming to follow in their footsteps and, coming to the end of his second season in F1, he is still riding a wave of good feeling after securing his first points for Williams in August, finishing seventh and ninth in successive races in Hungary and Belgium.
“It was very, very special,” Latifi recalls. “Williams have had some difficult years and the elation was building. It has brought a fresh energy.”
The momentum is about to switch to the Middle East swing, with impending races in Saudi Arabia and Qatar before the season finale in the UAE capital.
“Abu Dhabi is always one of my favourite races,” Latifi says. “There is a real buzz as it is the season finale and for Williams, it feels as though we are moving in the right direction. There is new energy and a belief that we can be competitive again.”
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At his home in Tel Aviv, Roy Nissany is reflecting fondly on his early experiences of motorsport. Sitting in an OMP drivers’ seat that was plucked out of an old racing car, his ‘office chair’ is a little higher spec than most.
Nissany is a global citizen in a global sport. Born in Israel, raised in Hungary and now also a French national, the 26-year-old is a test driver for Williams – one rung short of racing competitively in Formula One. His connection with F1 has been almost lifelong thanks to his father Chanoch, who became the sport’s first Israeli test driver for the Jordan and Minardi teams in the mid-2000s.
It was at this time that Nissany Jr. had a memorable first taste of a live F1 race. A photo from the 2004 Hungarian Grand Prix shows him wearing a Williams cap and hanging over the fence next to the track. He is trying get as close as possible to maverick Colombian driver Juan Pablo Montoya, his childhood hero.
“I look super excited,” Nissany says, smiling widely. “It’s funny because the day I signed for Williams, we were in the museum in Grove and I saw that car. You can imagine, it was an emotional day anyway and then I saw Montoya’s car and really I got chills. It was a dream come true.”
For Nissany, signing for Williams was the culmination of an ambition held since childhood. His pathway towards the top of motorsport started in junior go-karting and took in many teams and categories including F1 feeder competition Formula 2, in which he currently races for DAMS. The team has seen many of its drivers promoted to F1 over the years, including 2022 Williams pair Nicholas Latifi and Alex Albon, as well as established names like Romain Grosjean and Olivier Panis.
“When you start as a kid in karting, it seems very far away but the aim is always Formula One. Kids in karting admire F1, they watch every single race, they know everything about the cars.”
But very few of those aspirational juniors become adult racing drivers. Even fewer make it to F1.
It is little surprise. Driving is a psychological and physical endurance challenge unlike any other sport. Individual and high risk, motorsport’s history has been punctuated by tragedies. Ayrton Senna’s death at Imola in 1994 is perhaps the most infamous. He was driving a Williams that day and since 1995, every car the team has entered in F1 has carried an ‘S’ on it in tribute to the legendary Brazilian.
“Imagine you’re given a brush and told you have one shot to create a perfect painting,” Nissany says. “That’s what it feels like as a driver. You are alone in your car with your decisions and your ability.
And there are 19 talented other guys next to you ready to take advantage if you make a mistake. You have to manage the pressure and manage your own mentality.”
Nissany is back in the Middle East this month for events in Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi and believes that motorsport can continue to grow in the region.
“Hosting these Grands Prix makes a difference. In Bahrain it feels like the biggest event of the year. When there is a big atmosphere and big noise, of course it will capture people’s imagination and from there people will naturally want to race. I also love being at these races because of the food – it’s like what my mother used to make and means I feel very at home!”
With four Middle East races currently on the F1 calendar, there is an addition that Nissany would love to see more than any other.
“I’ve had this dream of a street race in Tel Aviv for a long time. There is a very nice road along the beach in the centre of the city that would form a beautiful start/finish line. I think about it a lot. It would take a lot of bureaucracy so it’s just a nice fantasy for now.”
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Back at Williams HQ in Grove, there is change afoot. Three years ago, the team launched an esports division. It was driven by Formula One’s American owners Liberty Media, with teams encouraged to enter the realm of sim racing to help F1 take a slice of the ever-growing esports pie.
What began as a step into the unknown and as chiefly a branding and marketing exercise has exploded into an important arm of the business. Steven English is the Head of Esports at Williams Racing; his job title did not exist a year ago.
“At a time when money was tight and the F1 car was at the back of the grid, it is a brave man who goes to the board and says ‘can you take some money away from the factory and spend it on computer games’,” English says. “It meant we had to run things smartly and now we are revenue generating and growing.”
In front of an audience of 63 million people in 2020, Williams won the virtual Le Mans race. It had replaced the in-person event because of the Covid-19 pandemic and showed that the team was able to compete at the highest level of esports. It now has more than 50 titles across multiple motorsport games.
At Grove, the esports offering is expanding further. A refurb will see more than 25 simulators available to play, with the facilities designed to host elite level international competitions, as well as corporate away days with a difference. Investment is also being made in human performance training and in payments to sim drivers, with a push towards professionalisation.
Tariq Gamil is one of 36 drivers currently on the Williams esports roster. He resides in Ireland but is a multiple-time Egyptian national champion and his Twitch name, CelticPharaoh, reflects his dual heritage.
“Football is the biggest sport in Egypt without a doubt but for the past decade or so the popularity of Formula One has been steadily growing,” says Gamil, proudly sporting a Williams-branded racing shirt. “It is becoming much more of a mainstream sport; sim racing and esports is helping that.”
Now 31, Gamil has been sim racing since he was a teenager. Competing in esports has allowed him to visit iconic circuits such as Spa Francorchamps in Belgium and Monza in Italy – it has given him experiences many racing fans could only dream of.
“A lot of esports teams only exist in an esports space but having the link with the Williams F1 team means there is an overlap between the commitment of the Grand Prix team and the esports team,” Gamil explains. “It is a focused and passionate environment.”
Like many drivers involved in esports, Gamil has long-held designs on racing for real. It can happen. In 2011, Englishman Jann Mardenborough won the GT Academy competition. By playing Gran Turismo better than 90,000 other entrants, he won a drive for Nissan at the Dubai 24 Hour and began his career as a professional driver.
Gamil came close himself a year earlier, reaching the 2010 GT Academy finals before being prevented from participating, a touch ironically, because he didn’t have a driving license.
“I’d say that the ultimate goal for 90 percent of sim racers would be to do real racing. As long as drivers like Jann Mardenborough and James Baldwin [who went from competing in Formula One Esports to the real British GT Championship] come through, people will have hope.”
Williams esports chief English feels it may still be a while before an esports drivers takes the wheel of an F1 car, but recognises the potential for that pathway to develop as sim racers tend to “pleasantly surprise” people when they move into real driving.
“Yes it could happen. We’d all love to see the headline ‘sim racer to drive Williams F1 car next season’ but the nature of F1 is that it is extremely competitive and there are many other factors.
“However, I do think more drivers will get a chance in F1 teams’ simulators, which are the coolest most expensive sim racing creations in the world.
“The great thing about esports is that it is attainable and accessible in a way motorsport has never been before. It’s more limiting in the real world for a driver of exceptional talent to display themselves to the world because of budget restrictions. Now they have a platform.”
It would have been unthinkable during Williams’ nineties zenith that a driver could graduate from a computer game to a seat at the uber-exclusive Formula One table. However it marries well with the team’s 2021 philosophy.
Williams may be big on heritage and nostalgia but it is simultaneously a breeding ground for talented drivers and now an esports racing pioneer too. The prospect of someone going from bedroom to F1 cockpit would be about as romantic a story as could be written for this grande dame of motorsport.
