The car was designed by Doug McKiernan and Dave Wheater, with David Worner and Jonathan Carter joining as Chief Designer and Deputy Chief Designer respectively. Williams have described the FW43 as being an evolution of its predecessor, believing the FW42 was a good basis on which to design the FW43. Several major changes were made regarding the side pods. Firstly the car introduced a steep slope from the top of the side pod to the floor to encourage the air to reach the floor of the car. This has drawn parallels with the side pod designs seen on the Red Bull RB8 and Sauber C31 seen in 2012. Williams have also reduced the size of the air inlets on the front of the side pods and have flattened the outer surface of the side pod. The wing mirror and wing mirror supports have also seen aerodynamic refinement.
The COVID-19 pandemic prompted the delay of technical regulations that had been planned for introduction in 2021. Under an agreement reached between teams and the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile, 2020-specification cars—including the FW43—saw their lifespan extended to compete in 2021. This led to the development of the FW43B for the 2021 season.
The FW43 made its competitive debut at the 2020 Austrian Grand Prix. At the Sakhir Grand Prix, Jack Aitken made his Grand Prix debut in the FW43, substituting for George Russell who was called up by Mercedes following Lewis Hamilton's positive COVID-19 test. Russell returned for the season finale in Abu Dhabi. Throughout the 2020 season, both Russell and Latifi struggled to score points, with the car proving sensitive when running in traffic. Russell achieved several promising results, including running in 13th place at the Austrian Grand Prix, 11th at the Styrian Grand Prix and running in 9th at the Tuscan Grand Prix and 10th at the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix before ultimately finishing outside the points in those races. Latifi achieved the team’s best result of the year, finishing 11th at the Italian Grand Prix.
The 2021 season saw the introduction of the FW43B, which represented a step forward in pace compared to its predecessor. George Russell qualified 2nd at the Belgian Grand Prix, and the race, though shortened and run under safety car conditions, resulted in a podium finish for Russell. Nicholas Latifi finished 9th in the same race. This marked Williams’ first podium since the 2017 Azerbaijan Grand Prix. The team scored their first points of the season at the Hungarian Grand Prix, with Latifi and Russell finishing 8th and 9th on the road, later promoted to 7th and 8th following Sebastian Vettel’s disqualification. Russell secured a third-place qualifying position at the Russian Grand Prix, finishing 10th in the race.
2021 was the final year for the Ayrton Senna tribute logo being presented on the front wing, which was used on every Williams car since 1995. At the 2021 Bahrain Grand Prix, the team paid tribute to the legendary Formula One commentator, Murray Walker, who died a week before the race; his quote "And I've got to stop, because I've got a lump in my throat" was carried on the halo device. At the 2021 Monaco Grand Prix, the team celebrated their 750th Grand Prix with the logo on the engine cover and 100 fans present on the halo device. At the 2021 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, the team paid tribute to their founder, Sir Frank Williams, who died a week before the race. To honour him, Williams ran the logo of their predecessor, Frank Williams Racing) Cars, behind the sidepods; this time, the message on the halo device read "I feel the need, the need for speed", a reference from the film Top Gun.
This article is based on information from the Wikipedia article "Williams FW43" and related pages. No primary sources, such as team archives, driver autobiographies, period programmes, or specialist publications, were consulted.
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