The Mercedes team had a disappointing race in Australia last weekend. Lewis Hamilton and George Russell both dropped out after starting the weekend in good spirits. James Allison states that they see a pattern at Mercedes.
Mercedes really wanted to attack the competition this year. In the past two seasons, the German racing team had many setbacks and they now wanted to say goodbye to that. The concept was completely changed, but this did not lead to good results in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Australia. In Melbourne the team performed very poorly and Hamilton dropped out early with engine problems. Russell seemed to be on his way to World Championship points, but he crashed heavily in the final phase.
No changes
Technical director James Allison admits that not everything goes according to plan. The large decline on Saturday in particular raised questions among the outside world. In Mercedes’ debrief on YouTube, Allison elaborates on this: “We made almost no changes between the third practice session and qualifying. We took fuel out of course and we turned the engine up to eleven. But we didn’t make any significant changes. because we felt we had put the car in a good window.”
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At Mercedes it is clear that something is going on. Technical director Allison is not secretive about this either, but he does send a worrying message to his team: “We are starting to see a pattern. In most race weekends we see that in part of the weekend we feel good about the car. and that we have confidence in it. But in the most important sessions, qualifying and the race, the car is slipping from our fingers.”
