Mercedes was expected to be the second force behind Red Bull, especially after James Allison's recent words spoken shortly before the start of the new Formula 1 World Championship, but instead the Brackley team had to deal with a different reality.
George Russell did not go beyond fifth place, behind the RB20s but also the two Ferrari SF-24s of Sainz and Leclerc also due to an overheating of the power unit which cost him some time. Lewis Hamilton fared no better. Seventh place finish but with several problems from the start.
The W15 number 44 had charging problems with the battery which led to a drop in power from the Mercedes power unit. Then came the overheating of the brakes to complicate everything.
“For a while the battery died, so on the straight I had a drop in power,” Hamilton said when asked by Motorsport.com about his problems.
“I lost a lot of ground compared to the McLarens. I had to solve the problem for a few laps and it took 10 laps, so I lost a lot of seconds.”
Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes F1 W15
Photo by: Steve Etherington / Motorsport Images
“Then I tried to get back on track and recover as soon as the problem was fixed. Then there was a bit of brake overheating. And then, in general, the performance was so-so.”
“I feel good,” Hamilton said of his race. “I don't feel down in the dumps. A very normal race. And I think when I go back and see the Red Bulls' times, that will add to the mix! They'll win everything for a while.”
Hamilton, however, said he was happy to have a good base on which to develop the car after two very complex years from this point of view.
“But what I feel is that over the last couple of years we've had all these problems. And we've spent several races sorting out these problems, trying to figure out what they were, and now we have a platform where we can start adding things and bricks and stuff. So now it's a building process from here, and I think we're a great team doing that.”
At the end of the first race weekend, Lewis placed Mercedes in third position. Third force behind Red Bull and Ferrari, despite Lando Norris managing to finish ahead of him in the race at Sakhir.
“We are very close to the McLarens. But I think that if I had qualified better, I probably would have finished fifth today even with the problems. So, if you exclude this aspect, I probably wouldn't have been so far from a Ferrari. But we are still the third closest fast”, concluded the 7-time world champion.
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