Williams Racing sues garage owner for £1m after historic FW23 chassis vanishes

Williams Racing is pursuing former Autotech Performance Ltd director Peter Thorpe in London’s High Court for more than £1 million, after a 2001 Williams FW23 chassis loaned to the Telford-based garage vanished during the company’s liquidation in the summer of 2021.

The missing FW23

The chassis at the centre of the dispute is no ordinary piece of hardware. During the 2001 Formula 1 season, Ralf Schumacher took three victories in the FW23, and his team-mate Juan Pablo Montoya claimed the first grand prix win of his career in the same car. Williams, which internally values the chassis at approximately £750,000, agreed in 2015 to loan the vehicle to Autotech Performance Ltd for commercial and promotional display purposes.

The arrangement held until Autotech formally liquidated its assets in mid-2021. When Williams moved to reclaim the car, it was gone. The team’s legal filings allege that Thorpe told liquidation evaluators the chassis was his personal property and removed it from the premises before Williams could intervene. The Grove-based squad is now demanding either the immediate physical return of the FW23 or financial compensation exceeding £1 million, a figure that incorporates the car’s assessed value alongside accumulated daily rental fees.

A medical defence

Thorpe and his legal team are contesting the allegations. The former director denies ever claiming personal ownership of the car and says he has no knowledge of its whereabouts after August 2021. His lawyers have disclosed that Thorpe suffered a debilitating stroke in October 2018, which they say left him with severe cognitive impairment and persistent memory difficulties — a condition they argue is central to understanding the gaps in his account.

The defence is also challenging Williams’s £750,000 valuation directly, with Thorpe’s representatives arguing that the FW23 was an empty display shell without a functional engine, and therefore worth considerably less than the team contends.

Heritage at stake

The case underscores how seriously top-tier Formula 1 teams guard their historical collections. For Williams, a constructor with nine Constructors’ Championships to its name, the FW23 represents a tangible link to one of its most competitive recent eras. The outcome of the High Court proceedings will determine whether that piece of history can be recovered — or whether the team must settle for financial restitution instead.