Williams recruits Somerville and Gillan

The stable Williams has every intention of making its return to the forefront next season. With this in mind, Sir Frank continues his redesign. Today, the recruitment of Jason Somerville, who will head the aero department from August 15, and Mark Gillan, who will be named Head of Engineering Operations on October 1, was announced. The two men will have the mission of working on the car current and on the development of that 2012, which will be called FW34. They will be under the leadership of Mike Coughlan, Head of Engineering.

Jason Somerville previously worked for Williams. He joined the team in 1997 as aerodynamicist in charge of the design and development of the BMW 5V12 LMR prototype which triumphed in 1999 at the 12 Hours of Sebring and the 24 Hours of Le Mans. He was then, in 1999, transferred to the F1 où il a travaillé sur les FW23, FW24 et FW25, puis a été promu en tant qu?adjoint au chef du département aéro. En 2003, il s?en va chez Toyota. Suite au retrait de Toyota fin 2009, il a été recruté par Renault F1 as project leader on the aerodynamic part. He notably played a leading role in the development of the current Lotus Renault GP R31.

The career of Mark Gillan in F1 started in 1998, where he was in charge of dynamics at McLaren, before taking charge of aero operations. In 2002, he moved to Jaguar where he was notably a racing and testing engineer. At the beginning of 2005, he left this stable which had become Red Bull Racing to teach at the University of Surrey before joining Toyota F1 as head of aero.

These are two choice recruits for Frank Williams and his team.