Williams getting stronger

Ralf Schumacher believes Williams' months of hard work are now paying off and the team is strong enough to be winning races. After an unsettled start to the season, Williams now has one victory on its scorecard, Juan Pablo Montoya in Monaco, and two ...

Ralf Schumacher believes Williams' months of hard work are now paying off and the team is strong enough to be winning races. After an unsettled start to the season, Williams now has one victory on its scorecard, Juan Pablo Montoya in Monaco, and two pole positions courtesy of Schumacher. The team has been working on aerodynamics and Ralf thinks progress is being made.

Ralf Schumacher.

Photo by Mark Gledhill.

"Concerning the further development of the FW25, the whole team has done a brilliant job," he said in an interview with BMW. "Now, we are reaping the reward of months and months of hard work. However, that doesn't mean that we can sit back and relax."

"We've been working day and night shifts in the wind tunnel in order to improve aerodynamics. But, in the end, not only aerodynamics count, but mainly the improvement of the whole package that consists of the car, engine and tyres -- and we have made great progress in this respect."

Compared to the beginning of 2003, Schumacher thinks Williams can now fight harder: "At the beginning of the season we would have only had chances to win if the other teams had made any mistakes; now, we are able to win because of our own strength."

Despite his confidence that things have improved, the German is not about to predict Williams will be favourite for victory at this weekend's European Grand Prix. "We mustn't get too excited," he cautioned.

"The Nurburgring has completely different characteristics than the circuits in Monaco or Canada. Aerodynamics will play a major role. Only if we'll be among the top drivers here, we can say that we have a real winner's car again."

Schumacher is currently fourth in the Driver's championship standings, a position he is reasonably happy with in the light of the poor start to the year. For the second half of the season he knows what his goal is: "That is very clear: I want to win races again. And as long as there is still a chance for me to win the World Championship, I'll go for the title."