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Frank Williams Charmed by New Jean Todt

It's not rocket science that Frank Williams never got along with Ferrari inside the Formula One championship. Fighting against each other for the championship year after year has that effect on people, so this really doesn't came as that much of surprise. Eventually, that rivalry is most of the times translated into people working for different teams not thinking very high of each other.

Such was the case of Frank Williams and Jean Todt, the former working for the best interests of his team and the latter making sure Ferrari's F1 operations are successful. Back when both were actively involved in F1 racing, Todt was not known to be much of a politician within the F1 paddock.

Nowadays, however, the Frenchman has been elected the new president of the International Automobile Federation (FIA), and being good with people was actually something he needs to have learned over the years. And that's exactly what he did, if we are to believe one of his greatest rivals in Formula One.

His methods weren't methods that we would use. He was then a difficult character. Very hard to get on with,” Williams was quoted as saying to the Arabian Business, following the season finale at Abu Dhabi. However, he did reveal that Todt is now a new man, at least from a political standpoint.

I met him recently (and) I think he has taken some charm lessons,” jokingly added the 67-year old team owner.

Although he had quite a good relationship with former FIA president Max Mosley, Williams didn't have the positive thoughts on his fellow countryman one would expect. He actually described him as “seriously unfairly clever” and “almost impossible to beat in any argument”.
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