Why missing the first test doesn’t have to define Williams’ 2026 season

Carlos Sainz’s warning that Williams has to “get everything right with the chassis” has resurfaced after the team confirmed that it will miss next week’s opening F1 2026 pre-season test.

Williams announced on Friday that it will miss next week’s opening test in Barcelona following “delays” in preparations with its 2026 car.

Carlos Sainz warning resurfaces as Williams prepares to miss first F1 2026 test

Want more PlanetF1.com coverage? Add us as a preferred source on Google to your favourites list for news you can trust

A five-day test will be held at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya across January 26-30 with teams restricted to a maximum of three days of running.

Williams’ decision to miss the first of three tests comes as a blow after the team enjoyed its most successful season in years in 2025.

In his first season with the team following his move from Ferrari, Sainz claimed two third-place finishes in Azerbaijan and Qatar, as well as matching the result in the United States Grand Prix sprint race.

Carlos Sainz and Alex Albon to race for Williams in F1 2026

F1 driver contracts: What is the contract status of every driver on the F1 2026 grid?

F1 2026 driver salaries: Who are the highest-paid drivers on the grid?

Sainz’s contribution saw Williams claim fifth in the constructors’ championship, the team’s best result since the 2017 season.

Williams’ fifth place came despite the Grove-based outfit ending the development of its 2025 car at an early stage of last season, with the team prepared to sacrifice its 2025 development in its bid to ace the new F1 2026 rules.

Williams is entering the 2026 season with high expectations due to its access to the Mercedes engine, which is widely expected to be the class of the field under the new rules.

Mercedes will power four teams on the F1 2026 grid including its own factory team, Williams, reigning constructors’ champions McLaren and Alpine.

In an interview last season, Sainz revealed that Williams’ Mercedes customer supply was a key factor behind his decision to sign for the team in the summer of 2024.

And he stressed the importance of Williams producing a chassis to match what is likely to be the standard-setting engine of 2026.

He told El Partidazo de COPE: “I have a lot of confidence in the Mercedes engine.

“It’s actually one of the main reasons I chose Williams for this new regulation change.

“I knew we’d be running the Mercedes power unit. Everything I’ve heard about it has been positive and still is.

“But of course, we can’t forget that Mercedes will have the Mercedes engine, McLaren will have it, Alpine will have it and so will Williams.

“That’s already four teams, eight cars, with the same engine – and two of those teams, especially McLaren, are superior right now.

“So no matter how good the engine is, you still need to get everything right with the chassis.

“That means we have to get everything right with the chassis to stand out.”

Sainz offered his support to Williams in the aftermath of the team’s announcement on Friday that it will miss the first test.

The four-time F1 race winner wrote on social media: “We are committed to keep pushing flat out! Can’t wait to hit the track soon.”

Despite the team’s progress over recent years, Williams’ decision to miss the first test is the latest setback to occur under the leadership of James Vowles, the former Mercedes strategist who became the third Williams team principal in the outfit’s history in January 2023.

Vowles infamously withdrew Logan Sargeant from the 2024 Australian Grand Prix after his teammate, Alex Albon, damaged his car in an accident in Friday practice.

With Williams lacking a spare chassis in Melbourne, the team controversially withdrew Sargeant and handed his car to Albon.

Vowles justified the decision by arguing that Albon, the team’s star driver, represented Williams’ best chance of scoring points at Albert Park.

Albon went on to finish 11th in Australia, narrowly missing out on a points finish.

Later that season, Albon was disqualified from qualifying at the Dutch Grand Prix after his floor was found to be in breach of the regulations.

Vowles conceded that Williams’ floor measurements were incorrect, vowing to implement “a process change to ensure that it doesn’t happen again.”

However, both Williams cars were then excluded from qualifying in Singapore in 2025 after the DRS slot gaps of Sainz and Albon’s cars were in breach of the legal limit.

Like Zandvoort 2024, Vowles once again said that Williams’ measurements had produced different results to the FIA’s, but accepted that the governing body’s readings were the only ones that mattered.

He again added that the team would “immediately review our processes to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”

Williams’ decision to miss testing saw fans draw comparisons to the team’s 2019 season, when the Grove-based outfit was late to testing and then arrived with a partially illegal car.

In an exclusive interview with PlanetF1.com in 2024, then-deputy team principal Claire Williams – the daughter of late team founder Sir Frank – admitted that 2019 testing marked the lowest point of her tenure.

She said: “I don’t have any grey hair, but I can’t believe that my head did not turn white during that period.

“Was it the hardest [period]? It probably was.

“It was an incredibly difficult time and it was probably one of the biggest failings of my time at Williams.

“We didn’t get done what we needed to do. We didn’t get the car to testing. I was the team principal at the time and the buck stops with me ultimately.

“What I can say about that period is we got through it. We got through it as a team. If anything came out of that, we made absolutely sure that we learned our lessons.

“We did not just go: ‘Oh, well, let’s hope we do better next year.’

“We spent month after month doing after-action reviews to understand where the failings were in the system on why that car did not meet the deadline.

“We made a number of changes off the back of those learnings. We got the 2020 car to testing ahead of time, it was ready ahead of time.

“We’re all human. We all make mistakes.

“Williams was a legacy team. I think we just assumed we’d get our car to testing and we didn’t.

“It was horrific and not an experience I ever want to go through again.”

Despite it being a blow to the team’s F1 2026 preparations, missing the first test does not necessarily leave Williams’ season in ruins.

The all-new regulations have seen the pre-season schedule expanded for 2026, with three separate tests taking place – up from three days of running in total – ahead of the season-opening Australian Grand Prix on March 8.

Williams is still scheduled to officially launch the FW48 on February 3 before the second test in Bahrain takes place across February 11-13.

The final test of the winter will also be held in Bahrain on February 18-20.

Want to be the first to know exclusive information from the F1 paddock? Join our broadcast channel on WhatsApp to get the scoop on the latest developments from our team of accredited journalists.

You can also subscribe to the PlanetF1 YouTube channel for exclusive features, hear from our paddock journalists with stories from the heart of Formula 1 and much more!

Read next: Ferrari planning failure already undermining Lewis Hamilton’s F1 2026 campaign