LONDON – The death of Sir Frank Williams, legendary founder and former team principal of Williams Racing, has sparked a wave of sadness in the racing world. He was 79.
Williams led his motorsport team from an empty carpet store to the summit of Formula 1, monitored 114 victories, a combined 16 driver and constructors’ championship and at the same time became the longest-serving team boss in the history of the sport.
“After being hospitalized on Friday, Sir Frank died peacefully with his family this morning,” Williams Racing said in a statement.
Williams driver George Russell remembered Williams as “truly wonderful people.” Russell, who will move from Williams next season to become Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes team-mate, was one of many who responded to the news on social media.
We are deeply and deeply saddened at the death of Sir Frank Williams
His life was shaped by a passion for motorsport; his legacy is immeasurable and will forever be part of Formula 1
Knowing him was an inspiration and a privilege
He is deeply missed pic.twitter.com/48JhruQpLK
– Formula 1 (@ F1) November 28, 2021
We have lost a true hero of our sport and an inspiration to so many beyond. Not only did Sir Frank create a special Formula 1 legacy, but he also demonstrated the power of human determination to overcome great adversity. In my thoughts with his family and the Williams team. pic.twitter.com/oVD73NkSKu
– Zak Brown (@ZBrownCEO) November 28, 2021
Goodbye, Sir Frank Williams
What an honor it has been to have had several conversations with you over the years. #rip #legend https://t.co/yi6SGZBahv
– Romain Grosjean (@RGrosjean) November 28, 2021
Sorry to see the news of Sir Frank Williams this morning. I’ve always been proud to say my dad drove for @WilliamsRacing. Frank was incredibly nice to my father and me when I was racing in Europe too. We felt like family. #RIP pic.twitter.com/Qo2zYDLUrP
– Conor Daly (@ ConorDaly22) November 28, 2021
RIP Sir Frank Williams CBE, founder of the Williams F1 team. We’ve had a very successful collaboration with some great drivers. @jpmontoya @lxznr. The gentleman of a gentleman. Warm regards to his family. @WilliamsRacing @CGRTeams
– Chip Ganassi (@GanassiChip) November 28, 2021
Today we say goodbye to the man who defined our team. Sir Frank was such a wonderful person and I will always remember our laughs together. More than just a boss, he was a mentor and friend to everyone who joined the Williams Racing family and many others. pic.twitter.com/bWpFivpkmi
– George Russell (@ GeorgeRussell63) November 28, 2021
RIP Sir Frank Williams. Such sad news 
A great loss to our sport and our team. It was an honor for us to represent your name on the world stage and we will continue to do our utmost to get the team back on the grid 
pic.twitter.com/4UKiU3CzB4
– Nicholas Latifi (@NicholasLatifi) November 28, 2021
We are sad to hear the death of Sir Frank Williams, a true pioneer of our sport.
We would like to express our condolences to his family, friends and the Williams Racing Team. pic.twitter.com/uo7fMA4Kxq
– Haas F1-Team (@ HaasF1Team) November 28, 2021
Williams’ life is all the more extraordinary when he was in a terrible car accident in France that injured him so much that doctors considered turning off his life support machine.
But his wife Virginia ordered that her husband stay alive, and his sheer determination and courage – qualities that embodied his career – enabled him to carry on the love of his life, albeit from the confines of a wheelchair.
He would stay in his role as Williams’ team boss for another 34 years before the largest Formula 1 family team was sold to an American investment group in August.
Francis Owen Garbett Williams was born in South Shields on April 16, 1942, to an RAF officer and a headmistress. He was educated at St Joseph’s College, a private boarding school in Dumfries, where he became obsessed with cars after driving a Jaguar XK150.
As a traveling salesman, Williams fulfilled his racing ambitions at the weekend and founded his own team, Frank Williams Racing Cars, at the age of 24.
pic.twitter.com/MsOEE5gx2n
– Valtteri Bottas (alValtteriBottas) November 28, 2021
Four years later they competed in Formula 2, and with roommate and closest friend Piers Courage behind the wheel, Williams drove a used Brabham to F1 in 1969.
But tragedy occurred at the 1970 Dutch Grand Prix.
Courage ran off the track, one of his front wheels hit his helmet and his car went up in flames. Courage’s gruesome death in a car that bears his name devastated Williams. Bankrupt and with increasing debts, he reluctantly sold 60 percent of his team to Walter Wolf in 1975.
It’s a sad day for our sport, Frank Williams will always be remembered as one of the heroes and #F1 icons.
My thoughts and prayers go with his family, especially his daughter Claire Williams. # RIP
pic.twitter.com/vSs7MUIUFO
– Sergio Pérez (@SCecoPerez) November 28, 2021
But Williams wasn’t made to be a backseat driver, and in a desperate search for independence, he parted ways with the Canadian businessman.
He opened a shop in an old carpet warehouse in Didcot, Oxfordshire, and signed a promising young engineer named Patrick Head. The double act should write Grand Prix history.
With Saudi Arabian funding and the hiring of Australian driver Alan Jones, Williams Grand Prix Engineering became a force.
The word legend is often used too freely. Sir Frank Williams will always be an F1 legend. Inspiring so many for his vision, courage and endless determination. Today is a sad day. https://t.co/xPguIh1Cnq
– Leigh Diffey (@leighdiffey) November 28, 2021
At the 1979 British Grand Prix, Jones scored Williams’ first pole position, before teammate Clay Regazzoni took the team’s first victory a day later.
In 1980 Jones Williams delivered his first title. The team also won consecutive constructors ‘championships, while Keke Rosberg was crowned drivers’ champions in 1982. But in 1986, Williams’ life would change forever.
After a test on the Paul Ricard racetrack in March, Williams set off for Nice Airport in a rented Ford Sierra. Williams drove through the winding roads at high speed, lost control, and landed on the roof in a field after a 2.5 meter fall.
Williams’ co-driver, the team’s marketing manager Peter Windsor, got away with minor injuries. But Williams suffered a spinal fracture that would leave him in a wheelchair for the rest of his life.
“I was late for a plane that I didn’t have to be late for because I was mistaking French time for English time,” Williams later said. “The roads were very bumpy, the rental car wasn’t the best in the world, and suddenly I was upside down with a broken neck.
“It was very unfair to my family, especially my wife, because my circumstances changed. In retrospect, it was a negligent and selfish thing. Life went on and I could go on, but it was a handicap in the truest sense of the word. “
A poignant memory
Flashback when Lewis Hamilton led Sir Frank Williams on a hot lap around his beloved Silverstone pic.twitter.com/tAChZOnHyN
– Formula 1 (@ F1) November 28, 2021
Despite his life-changing injuries, Williams was back at the top of his team within nine months. In the following 11 years, five more driver championships followed – including those for Nigel Mansell and Damon Hill – as well as seven constructors’ titles.
But Williams would cause even more grief when Ayrton Senna was killed in only his third race for the British team at the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix.
Williams was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1999, but his team never repeated its heyday of the 1980s and 1990s. In 2013, the year his wife died, he resigned so that his daughter Claire could take over the day-to-day running of the team.
Sorry to hear of Sir Frank Williams’ death. One of the great joys of my career was meeting Frank and driving the @WilliamsRacing. RIP https://t.co/vrsAk1pxQX
– Jeff Gordon (@JeffGordonWeb) November 28, 2021
Williams battled pneumonia in 2016, but he’s been an erratic fixture in the paddock for a number of years.
And in September 2020, after the Italian Grand Prix in Monza, a historic sporting chapter was closed when the Williams family contested their 739th and final race after being sold to Dorilton Capital.
Williams leaves behind his three children, sons Jonathan and Jamie and Claire, and grandsons Ralph and Nathaniel.
The post The death of F1 team legend Frank Williams leaves the racing world in mourning first appeared on monter-une-startup.
