Williams on Top: Can They Finally Reclaim F1 Glory?

Friday practice at Melbourne threw up some surprises, but few of the events at Albert Park were quite as unexpected as the sudden resurgence of the Williams team.

After the Grove-based privateer outfit was cleared to race this weekend, with a protest over the legality of the teams' diffuser being thrown out, drivers Nico Rosberg and Kazuki Nakajima put in some impressive laps during Friday's practice sessions.

The first session saw the two cars first and second, with Rosberg ahead. In the afternoon session, Rosberg again topped the time sheets, while Nakajima was seventh fastest, half a second away from his German teammate's benchmark time.

It has been a long time since Williams saw success in Formula One; their last victory came at the end of 2004, courtesy of Juan Pablo Montoya.

Furthermore, the last of the teams' world championships came in 1997, with Jacques Villeneuve taking the drivers crown and helping the team secure a ninth Constructors World Title, then a Formula One record.

Since then Williams has had a difficult time in F1, a hatful of victories in the early part of the decade thanks to a lucrative association with German car manufacturer, BMW.

But the relationship with the Bavarian company turned sour in 2005, when team boss Frank Williams refused to allow BMW to supply assistance in designing the car as well as providing engines for the team.

BMW and Williams parted company at the end of that season, and the British team endured a difficult 2006 using expensive and sponsor-unfriendly Cosworth engines, a strong chassis plagued by dreadful reliability.

An engine deal was struck with Toyota for the following season. 2007 was a slightly better year for the team, though their only visit to the podium was a fortunate third place for Alexander Wurz in Canada.

In 2008 the team seemed to be improving, two podiums for Rosberg highlighted the year, though they finished the season eighth in the Constructors standings.

Now in 2009 they are looking to return to F1's winner's circle. The question is, are they likely to do it?

Given this morning's form alone, one would be tempted to tip them for victory at least once this season.

But Williams, especially in recent years often starts a season strongly before rapidly dropping down the field.

In 2006, Mark Webber and Nico Rosberg finished the season opening Bahrain Grand Prix in sixth and seventh respectively, with Rosberg setting the fastest lap of the race.

And last season Rosberg drove a great race in Australia to finish third behind Lewis Hamilton and Nick Heidfeld, himself a former Williams driver now in the BMW Sauber.

But as the season progressed, in both cases Williams fell further and further down the order. 2006 saw the teams' worst points haul in nearly thirty years, and a competitive midfield in 2008 meant that they could not improve on eighth overall.

The teams' budget is small compared to most of the other competitors making up the 2009 F1 field. Therefore it is inevitable that Williams will be outstripped in the in-season development race by their rivals.

The pace we see from Williams early in the season may not be representative of how they will perform throughout the year.

There is also the question of drivers.

Nico Rosberg is one of the most highly-rated young drivers in the Formula One field, but with rising stars such as Robert Kubica and Sebastian Vettel not only being talked about a lot, but actually delivering results, Rosberg's stock is falling quickly.

The Germans' excellent debut is still talked about, but it is becoming increasingly clear that whatever flash of brilliance inspired that performance from Rosberg, it doesn't come around very often.

Superb qualifying performances from Rosberg in 2008, such as in Monaco, were diminished in the race when he crashed heavily, throwing away the chance of a strong points finish.

And in the following race in Canada, a top five finish was in the offing before he embarrassingly ran into the back of Lewis Hamilton in the pit lane, the British driver having embedded his McLaren into the rear of Kimi Raikkonen just moments before.

Thus, as highly as Rosberg is rated, questions surely still persist over his ability.

If he wants to leave Williams for a stronger team in 2010, as he has hinted, this year would be the perfect opportunity for him to prove his doubters wrong and deliver a spectacular set of results for the team; until then, caution must be exercised over whether young Nico is as good as we have been told.

Japanese youngster Nakajima, Williams' second driver, showed excellent promise and a regrettable lack of discipline in fairly equal measure last season.

When the Williams team was capable of scoring points, Nakajima almost always finished in the top eight, but his raw pace was lacking, and he often failed to complete a race without being involved in some kind of amusing incident with another car.

Kazuki has much to learn in his second full season of Formula One. he will deliver results on his day, but whether those days will coincide with strong races for the team remains to be seen.

With technology and the standard of the car so important in F1, it is often tempting to sideline the drivers as incidental to the success of a team.

Indeed, Williams has been guilty of this on many occasions in the past, with world champions such as Nigel Mansell and Damon Hill dropped from the team after demanding too much money.

But a good car with a mediocre driver, in today's ultra-competitive world of F1 cannot hope to win races, let alone challenge for the title.

It is the drivers who will make the difference between front-of-the-midfield obscurity and headline making performances, and in this respect Williams may come up short this season.

Billed as F1's "last true privateer," it would be a heartening day for the sport as a whole if one of Frank Williams' drivers could take to the top step of the podium at some time in 2009.

It would also be a just reward for the huge amounts of hard work that go on at the teams' factory.

But while the teams' prospects, on Friday in Australia, look pretty good, it is hard to imagine this little outfit being truly at the sharp end for the whole year.