Williams has insisted that its decision to field two young drivers this year played no part in Martini’s decision not to remain on board as its title sponsor beyond 2018.
The iconic Martini brand returned to Formula 1 with Williams in 2014, on a five-year deal, but it was confirmed last week that it would not renew, and is set to depart the sport altogether.
Martini has preferred Williams to have drivers over 25, which remained the case from 2014 through 2017, with Felipe Massa ever-present, off-setting the presence of 18-year-old Lance Stroll last season.
However, Williams will this season field Stroll, 19, and 22-year-old rookie Sergey Sirotkin, who will form the youngest line-up on the 2018 grid.
Williams, though, has denied that Martini’s impending departure from the team was related to its choice of drivers for the upcoming campaign.
“I talked quite a lot last year about making sure we had drivers who were able to activate from a marketing perspective because of Martini’s 25 year age limit,” said Williams.
“Going into this year it is hard to find drivers over 25.
“They [Martini] were fully supportive of us bringing in Sergey and it played no part in their decision-making process moving forward as they were fully aware of ours plans and supportive of it.
“I suppose next year it gives us the freedom to do what we want without having to worry about age limits.”
Williams claimed back-to-back third places in the standings 2014 and 2015, but fell behind fellow Mercedes customer Force India through 2016, slipping to fifth, and repeated the position last year, albeit further adrift of its rival.
Williams is wary that retaining fifth position will be a tough proposition, in light of expected improvements from Renault and McLaren this year.
“Our goal is never to maintain fifth in the championship, our goal is to win,” Williams outlined.
“It is to make progress too. We weren’t happy with fifth place last year as anyone would imagine.
“Force India did a fantastic job and we are really hoping we’d get fourth but hey they did a much better job than us.
“We have a lot of exciting things happening in our team at the moment, not at least with Paddy Lowe’s involvement in our team, as he didn’t or couldn’t have much of an impact on the team’s car last year as he joined at the start of the season when the car was already done.
“The pressure is on him and his engineering team to deliver for this year but it is going to be tough with more challenges out there with Force India and McLaren with their Renault engine plus Renault are looking strong this week.
“I think it will be difficult but we have to make progress and that is what we are always fighting for at Williams every single day.”
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