The questions are: can Williams beat McLaren, can they challenge Ferrari? That, clearly should be the aim after last year's superb season. The team did better than expected, and this year have two drivers settled with the team, albeit with different personalities. They won last year, they should do so again.

But the noises haven't been encouraging. Both BMW (in the person of Gerhard Berger) and Williams himself have said that there is still much to do. The BMW engine hasn't been entirely reliable, but as ever, the team has made a massive effort to ready itself with the its new engine for the new season.

This year, however, they share their position at Michelin with McLaren, and the question will be who will receive the more suitable tyres. Niki Lauda commented that McLaren prefer softer tyres to those preferred by Williams. So will the advent of McLaren be to Williams's disadvantage? That's one of many questions to be answered.

It has to be said that Williams is particularly proud of its position in Grand Prix racing. Frank has built up a team that is generally speaking stable, with people who have been at Williams for many years. That's the way he and Patrick Head like it: not too many changes, people that they know and have grown up with. When Adrian Newey left, there was no hunting around for other people's superstar designers; they simply promoted from within.

Everywhere in Grand Prix racing you find people who have been to the Frank Williams finishing school of Engineering - usually known as Williams Grand Prix Engineering. Neil Oatley and Newey at McLaren, Frank Dernie at Lola, Ross Brawn at Ferrari, James Robinson and Jock Clear at BAR and many others all started their careers with Frank.

The latest graduate is former chief aerodynamicist Geoff Willis who leaves for BAR this spring. There is no word as to who will replace him, but it will probably be someone within the team. The only newcomer who has come from 'outside' recently has been Sam Michael, chief operations engineer, with whom Williams are clearly pleased.

Once again, Williams have made a massive effort in testing with three cars available. They have retained Marc Gene as test driver, and added F3000 driver Antonio Pizzonia. Stability allows Ralf Schumacher to retain his race engineer, but Juan Pablo Montoya will now be looked after by Tony Ross rather than Tim Preston. Again, Williams have worked hard with Michelin as their position as number one team has been threatened by McLaren.

However, Williams are not on their own. They have considerable support from BMW, where Gerhard Berger and Dr Mario Thyssen are still in charge, ably supporter by Werner Laurenz. But there is some confusion as to who has been responsible for what looks to be reasonable testing performances. Gerhard Berger has said it's the chassis that is to blame for not setting consistently fast times, but the latest engine has been so troublesome that they ran out of engines at one of their marathon tests.

They started off testing as they meant to continue: three cars at the first test in Barcelona, two fitted with new P82 engine. And Antonio Pizzonia was quickest on that first day. Testing continued at a rapid pace throughout the following days and twice the team had a massive marathon of testing, going for almost a full week or more.

The problems, however, were mainly mechanical. There weren't too many on-track dramas. The new car first ran at Silverstone on January 25 and began testing at Barcelona two days later, completing 59 laps on the first day and going quickest on the second. The massive test programmes continued right up to the moment the cars were to be shipped to be Melbourne, but there were still suggestions that the cars were not as quick as they might be, although the problems were slowly being solved.

Williams have to be looking at challenging McLaren and Ferrari for number one spot this year. They rarely look for less anyway but after last year's performance, they have to be looking for more wins and therefore a rise in the championship. As ever, they will be committing all their resources - which have been strengthened by one or two more sponsors - in achieving this aim.

Bob Constanduros