From the 2022 tests until the Monaco Grand Prix in May, Mercedes persistently tried to carry on the zeropod concept, which only the Brackley-based team developed for the new Formula 1 regulations that came into force last year.
Then he changed the W14 to adopt the downwash philosophy preferred by Red Bull, but with the addition of a “waterslide” similar to that of McLaren and Aston Martin.
With this update, Lewis Hamilton and George Russell both finished on the podium at the following race in Barcelona.
Since then, Hamilton has taken a string of third-place finishes and also took pole in Hungary, taking advantage of a rare mistake by Max Verstappen in Q3. But the ‘super-time’ metric – which records each team’s fastest lap over a race weekend – indicates that Mercedes went from a 0.504% deficit (Monaco) to Red Bull to 0.502% (Silverstone) and finished the first part of the season at 0.866% (Spa).
Despite this, Hamilton praised the “great strides” the team has made, stating: “I’m incredibly proud of everyone. Everyone has been working extremely hard.”
“We’ve made big steps forward. I think the most important step was taken in Monaco and the car has made a lot of progress since then.”
“We understood better where to place the car. It has been much more consistent, with podiums and top-five finishes, which has been fantastic.”
“And, in general, we’ve gotten great reliability. So, there’s a lot of positives.”
Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes W14
Photo by: Erik Junius
In pointing out where the W14 has yet to progress, Hamilton pointed to a lack of downforce and balance. The latter problem was raised at the start of the season, when he struggled to find the feeling with the car, due to a cockpit positioned significantly further forward than Red Bull and Ferrari.
Hamilton continued: “We still have to work on the balance. And we need more downforce, as always. But I know that everyone at the factory is focused on this aspect.”
“We are focused on finishing second for the team in the Constructors’ championship and I’m looking to finish third in the Drivers’ standings.”
Hamilton is currently fourth in the standings, just a point behind Fernando Alonso’s Aston Martin. The seven-times world champion added that he expects the order behind Red Bull to shuffle again during the second half of the season.
“I don’t know how much it will develop in the second half of the season, but I think there will be movement. I don’t know what happened to Aston and why they took this step back. But I’m sure McLaren has been very strong in the last few races.” .
“Ferrari and we were very close, so it depends on the track, I’m sure there will be some movement in the positions. I hope we can do a little better.”
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