Engineer Smedley joins Massa at Williams

Felipe Massa’s long-time Ferrari race engineer Rob Smedley has joined the Brazilian at Williams.

The Englishman, whose voice has become familiar to fans all over the world because of his conversations with Massa over race radio, has been appointed to the newly-created role of head of vehicle performance and will join the Grove-based team prior to the Bahrain race in April.

A statement on Williams’ website said Smedley’s arrival will “strengthen the trackside team whilst also supporting the development work back at the factory to help bring more performance to the car throughout the season.”

Massa will be engineered by Andrew Murdoch in 2014, whilst Jonathan Eddolls will continue to race engineer Valtteri Bottas. Completing Williams’ trackside operations line-up is Richard Lockwood who joins from Marussia as the team’s new head of race strategy.

"Williams is undergoing change and these new appointments reflect how high our ambitions are," said Pat Symonds, Williams’ chief technical officer.

"We have a number of senior people joining us to assist us in the pursuit of those ambitions and I am extremely excited to welcome them on-board.

"2014 gives us the biggest change to the technical regulations that I have seen in my career, and so it will be important to add further depth to the talent we already have here as we head into the new season.

"Williams has always prided itself on engineering excellence and this latest announcement is part of our continued goal to bring success back to the team."