Williams FW20

The date is October 26th, 1997. The place, the Circuit de Jerez Spain. After driving the race of his life against stiff competition, Jacques Villeneuve in a Williams Renault FW19 took the FIA Formula One World Drivers Championship. For Frank Williams and his team the result is the icing on the cake after taking the coveted FIA Formula One World Constructors Championship just two weeks earlier at the Japanese Grand Prix. The victory raises the British team over Ferrari in the all-time Constructors Championship standings, the Italian team on eight, Williams on nine. The achievement is rendered even more impressive by the fact that Williams began competing in Formula One almost 30 years after Ferrari. Founded in 1977, Williams Grand Prix Engineering's first race was in 1978. At that time there were many more cars on the grid but the number of teams has fallen - mainly due to cashflow, problems - and is now down to 17. The grid is made up of 22 drivers who contend for the 16 Grand Prix races held annually on some of the world's most coveted racetracks. A typical Grand Prix weekend consists of four practice sessions that build up to Saturday's all important qualifying hour where the drivers battle for Pole Position for Sunday's race. The work continues when the cars are back in the garage. The mechanics continually adjust the cars to get the perfect set-up while the engineers and drivers discuss strategy and car set-up lung into the evening. When race day comes everyone's attention is focused on the track as the drivers vie for a spot on the podium and critical Championship points.