2024 Mercedes-AMG | Petronas F1 Team

[ringo]

I find nothing wrong with a team struggling to get a regulation formula right. Has happened loads of times before, with various teams. It's nothing abnormal.

What I am unable to stand, is the 'extended coverage' accorded to Mercedes team. Why ? Why is Mercedes getting more air-time and more media-time than teams like VCARB or ALPINE or SAUBER etc ? Mercedes as a team is consistently 'midfielder' in 2024, for sure.

Whether it's the bias towards 'british racers' , 'brackley our backyard' or 'hamilton worship' by the predominantly British media or whether it's the 'knives out' glee from Mercedes haters, there is just too much talk. Too much. A team is struggling. Leave them alone. Maybe this team will be a permanent midfielder for the next 10 yrs, maybe they will be back to being the top dog in 2026. Who knows. But please, please, reduce this hyper-importance accorded to the struggles of one team. Many others are struggling as well.

Nothing to do with British. More to do with Mercedes being a recent dominant force.
I dont buy the jingoist narrative that Alonso and others are bringing into the sport. I do not think it's healthy. It's a false narrative and it can be dangerous. I am indifferent to Europe and I really dont see any British bias going on to the scale Alonso and others in the forum claim.
Alonso is loved and always praised by the same British media. Lando is not praised enough. And Mclaren is not really getting much attention for the good job theyre doing. The focus from the media is on Max, Redbull, Ferrari, and Mercedes and then Alonso. There are reasons for this, but not nationality of the drivers or teams.
Edit: Lewis also. Lewis gets more camera time than others. But because of his fame and because he usually is in the hunt to overtake or fight for position when others dont seem to be able to.

[SKYnRacing24]

Russell is such a Merc PR NPC(Understandable in some ways) Even he's not that deluded with the nonsense he's coming out. They went the other way on fixing the problems and now have gone too far in that direction. Like what exactly ? overall downforce levels? rear limited ? front limited ?. Sounds to me there suspension for this year can't utilise the tyres consistently. They brought forward the Imola setup but imo just can't utilise it with these constant sprint weekends. Imola will be the main focus if they can turn this season around.

Everybody at Merc has been throwing around excuses. Lewis, Toto, Russell.

Also, I dont understand why people are all agreeing the 'driver battle doesn't matter' here simply cuz the car isn't super consistent. Like, that's the norm in F1 when you dont have a top car. You never hear for all these other teams this year or in any other year that the 'driver battle doesn't matter' simply because there's variance in competitiveness. The job of drivers is always to make the most of what they have, and this is typically the defining characteristic that separates the best from the rest.

Lewis simply is not doing very good this year. Might be hard for some to admit, but that's reality. I feel like people just really, really dont want to give Russell any credit, as if Lewis being faster/better is the 'default' and when this isn't actually the case, people just say the driver battle isn't important.

Hamilton is definitely slower than Russell atm. The stop watch doesnt lie and as a Hammy fan myself i can accept that at the end of the day your competition is your team mate and him being 6-1 down in qualy and 5-0 atm in the race is something i can't excuse tbh. Now regarding Russell its simply because people dont really give a crap about him. Once Lewis leaves most of the traffic will go from this thread. Russell will be fine of course but i truly believe this team wont get back to winning ways even after the 2026, they have too many problems. He needs to be wary about wasting his prime years in a pos merc imo.

[Cs98]

Russell is such a Merc PR NPC(Understandable in some ways) Even he's not that deluded with the nonsense he's coming out. They went the other way on fixing the problems and now have gone too far in that direction. Like what exactly ? overall downforce levels? rear limited ? front limited ?. Sounds to me there suspension for this year can't utilise the tyres consistently. They brought forward the Imola setup but imo just can't utilise it with these constant sprint weekends. Imola will be the main focus if they can turn this season around.

Everybody at Merc has been throwing around excuses. Lewis, Toto, Russell.

Also, I dont understand why people are all agreeing the 'driver battle doesn't matter' here simply cuz the car isn't super consistent. Like, that's the norm in F1 when you dont have a top car. You never hear for all these other teams this year or in any other year that the 'driver battle doesn't matter' simply because there's variance in competitiveness. The job of drivers is always to make the most of what they have, and this is typically the defining characteristic that separates the best from the rest.

Lewis simply is not doing very good this year. Might be hard for some to admit, but that's reality. I feel like people just really, really dont want to give Russell any credit, as if Lewis being faster/better is the 'default' and when this isn't actually the case, people just say the driver battle isn't important.

Hamilton is definitely slower than Russell atm. The stop watch doesnt lie and as a Hammy fan myself i can accept that at the end of the day your competition is your team mate and him being 6-1 down in qualy and 5-0 atm in the race is something i can't excuse tbh. Now regarding Russell its simply because people dont really give a crap about him. Once Lewis leaves most of the traffic will go from this thread. Russell will be fine of course but i truly believe this team wont get back to winning ways even after the 2026, they have too many problems. He needs to be wary about wasting his prime years in a pos merc imo.

Becoming the de facto Nr 1 at Merc still gives Russell the best chance at success. This team has all the resources in the world to succeed, one day it will click and they will be back competing for wins. As for Russell's profile, Hamilton leaving will do some good to help establish his own brand. Currently when he does well it's used against him by disgruntled fans and it just becomes a toxic environment. Praising or even acknowledging Russell is usually followed by a line of people giving countless excuses, detracting, or just being flat out rude. All in all not that fun if you are a casual fan looking to support a driver.

[j_ste]

Started on the hard tyre and pitted too early...sheesh

[F1Krof]

Why would one strategist decide to start on Hards to compromise the start and then pit on then same Meds pitted?

I mean how stupid can you be? Ffs man, the strategy department should be fired!

[Hoffman900]

Why would one strategist decide to start on Hards to compromise the start and then pit on then same Meds pitted?

I mean how stupid can you be? Ffs man, the strategy department should be fired!

I had a feeling this was going to happen based on past history. Oof

[DGP123]

Hamilton is definitely slower than Russell atm.

No he isn’t

[Cs98]

Hamilton is definitely slower than Russell atm.

No he isn’t

Maybe reply to the person who actually wrote that

[Hoffman900]

Why is everyone worried about Lewis and George, when the team consistently gets beat by customer teams now?

They’re a lot closer to each other than Merc is to the three teams in front of them

[F1Krof]

Just looking at first 3 teams, there's gotta be some sort of double diffusor trick.

[mkay]

Mercedes' gap to P1 hasn't changed, despite the car in P1 having changed.

McLaren's track record in bolting on performance upgrades has been unmatched in the past 12 months.

[Hoffman900]

Just looking at first 3 teams, there's gotta be some sort of double diffusor trick.

Absolutely not

The double diffuser wasn’t even the trick, it was the outwash front wing they brought over from Indy Car. This is all well documented by everyone involved and they laugh about how everyone was misguided by the double diffuser and slow to catch on.

[j_ste]

Why is everyone worried about Lewis and George, when the team consistently gets beat by customer teams now?

They’re a lot closer to each other than Merc is to the three teams in front of them

Exactly

Lando was pulling away from Max easily. Lewis was just about staying in Perez DRS...McLaren are so far ahead.
So happy for McLaren but full of jealousy, too

[Just_a_fan]

Hamilton is definitely slower than Russell atm.

Not today he wasn't.

[Luscion]

Lewis managed to hunt a Red Bull from lap 32 all the way until the few final laps of the race on a track thats very hard to overtake on and people are still complaining about Merc, had Piastri not gotten damage and given Perez drs Lewis would have likely been able to pass him in a couple laps