In 2021 the Mercedes she lost a driver’s championship title for the first time in the hybrid era, being mocked by Max Verstappen and Red Bull in the controversial season finale in Abu Dhabi. Leaving aside the controversies regarding the controversial work of Race Director Michael Masi, it must be recognized that throughout the year the Brackley team no longer gave the impression of being the unstoppable war machine seen for seven seasons from 2014 to 2020. In the first few races, the W12 of Hamilton and Bottas performed lower than the RB16B built in Milton Keynes. And even in the second part of the year, when the silver arrow had returned to being the best car on the track, he thought about creating difficulties for the Stella’s house. reliability.
In fact, on many occasions both Hamilton and above all Valtteri Bottas have had to serve significant penalties on the grid of departure due to the constant replacements of the power units for safety reasons. Not just obstacles, which the seven-time world champion overcame brilliantly especially at Interlagos, but which certainly did not help Toto Wolff’s team in the attempt to comeback on Red Bull, which in the end succeeded are in the constructors ‘standings, but not in the drivers’ standings. A setback for those who over the years had built their own domain on rock-solid reliability.
Speaking with the German site Auto Motor und SportWolff himself acknowledged that this was a weak point of the silver arrows during the season. “We didn’t lose the world championship because of the engine. But it is true that we had problems for the first time in eight years“admitted the Viennese manager. “In the beginning, the problem only involved one component of a bad production batch. This then evolved into damage, whereby the engines lost more power than usual during their operating period “he concluded.
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