2023 Mercedes-AMG | Petronas F1 Team

[Farnborough]

GR passed 5 other competitors by going off track and gaining advantage, hardly a realistic comparison is it.

Objectively he did not. At most, he might have passed one car, but Piastri got crowded at the entry to turn 3 and got overtaken by other cars behind him as a result, so it's really hard to say. Russell leaves the track next to the Haas, and rejoins behind it.

If you're going to post, at least spent 30 seconds watching a replay of what happened.

Thank-you for sitting in judgment in my level of understanding, but with multiple views available it's clear a significant positional advantage was gained, this with no real racing in regard to time frame to get past those competitors through the ensuing laps, the fuel usage, tire deg etc etc.

If GR had passed those other competitors (he did pass some in braking phase) AND kept within the track boundaries, then that could legitimately be described as his performance purely against the others.

He didn't, wasn't able to keep within the track limits (essentially outbraking himself) and gained those position. If the route was solely on the track it could be seen as the true performance of chassis and driver. It cant really be judged any other way.

[SiLo]

GR passed 5 other competitors by going off track and gaining advantage, hardly a realistic comparison is it.

Objectively he did not. At most, he might have passed one car, but Piastri got crowded at the entry to turn 3 and got overtaken by other cars behind him as a result, so it's really hard to say. Russell leaves the track next to the Haas, and rejoins behind it.

If you're going to post, at least spent 30 seconds watching a replay of what happened.

Thank-you for sitting in judgment in my level of understanding, but with multiple views available it's clear a significant positional advantage was gained, this with no real racing in regard to time frame to get past those competitors through the ensuing laps, the fuel usage, tire deg etc etc.

If GR had passed those other competitors (he did pass some in braking phase) AND kept within the track boundaries, then that could legitimately be described as his performance purely against the others.

He didn't, wasn't able to keep within the track limits (essentially outbraking himself) and gained those position. If the route was solely on the track it could be seen as the true performance of chassis and driver. It cant really be judged any other way.

He's clearly able to make the corner but bails when he sees the gap rapidly closing as the Haas comes across. It's very similar to a few other overtakes at that corner throughout the race.

[organic]

In hindsight it's not a consequential moment IMO. The only car he's side by side with who he stays ahead of is Piastri. Could be argued that George should've been told to give the position back. He wasn't and RC could've given a 5s penalty for it, but even that wouldn't change the race result.

And let's say George hadn't taken the excursion and he'd have been behind Piastri.. He would've cleared him within the first 2 laps maximum with the pace the Merc had in hand. So really not that important

[wogx]

(the original W14 is obviously a W13B, not the real W14)

Where did Mercedes say this officially?

[chrisc90]

Guess if that’s how we comparing the WDC then we should only count the result from Barcelona then given that the car was completely different.

The W14 was a evolution of the W13, same way the RB19 is a evolution of the RB18.

Quite frankly, not that interested in comparing drivers, never gets anywhere. To say Russell wiped the floor with Perez in a slower car, in one race, and claiming he’s one of the best drivers on the grid, is, in my opinion, implausible and wrong. Thats not even considering they were on different tyre strategies, with Perez starting on a slower Medium compared to Russell on a soft. Perez switching to a hard, and russell a Medium and then both finishing on the soft.

Should we look at the times when Perez was consistently faster than Russell on a slower tyre in the middle stint? How about the final stint to compare when Perez was a second a lap faster then dropping down to roughly .750 faster than Russell? Should we just brush over that?




Red Bull admitted, and its pretty obvious to anyone with a hint of knowledge of F1, they chose a non optimal tyre strategy in Barcelona. The S-M-S was the optimum strategy for race day.

Of course, this is only the 7th Race of the season, and the first with Mercedes bringing a new car, so lets see what happens going forwards, and then people can come and claim GR is wiping the floor with Perez.

[CMSMJ1]

Please stop the fanboy Driver vs Driver in this thread.

Thank you.

[Just_a_fan]

(the original W14 is obviously a W13B, not the real W14)

Where did Mercedes say this officially?

Where did they say it wasn't?

It's entirely obvious to anyone that has followed the sport longer than the DTS episodes, that the current car is very different to the previous car. The previous car was very similar to the car before that.

If that's tricky to understand then that's on you.

[organic]

Agreed.. it's pretty obvious how minimal the work done to create the launch spec W14 was.

We all suspected it as soon as testing came around and they were talking about a large upgrade package for the European leg immediately. This coincided with reports from Italian motorsport.com that they had issues over the winter of some sort and that their intended car wouldn't debut at the start of the season. And the large visual change & performance jump now apparent with the new package just ties the ribbon, right?

None of it is making logical leaps. It's a few assumptions but this timeline comes naturally from all of the news reported and from what team members have said.

Besides, it would not be sensible in a budget cap era to build the launch spec W14 as well as they can and then suddenly plan such extensive changes to fundamental components such as suspension at round 5 of the season, and have it planned out to such an extent that they knew they would do this even before running in preseason.. if they knew these problems existed prior to preseason they wouldn't have built them into the launch W14.

The merc's first sidepod/engine cover just didn't look like something they'd spent a ton of time on. Just like their Barcelona preseason testing sidepod in '22.

[PlatinumZealot]

Drivers are saying the new suspension means stronger rear stability into corners and stronger front axle stability going out of corners... interesting to analyze it in more depth...and how it ties into aero balance and differential.

[Henri]

Drivers are saying the new suspension means stronger rear stability into corners and stronger front axle stability going out of corners... interesting to analyze it in more depth...and how it ties into aero balance and differential.

It gives them more confidence to push

[Hammerfist]

Agreed.. it's pretty obvious how minimal the work done to create the launch spec W14 was.

We all suspected it as soon as testing came around and they were talking about a large upgrade package for the European leg immediately. This coincided with reports from Italian motorsport.com that they had issues over the winter of some sort and that their intended car wouldn't debut at the start of the season. And the large visual change & performance jump now apparent with the new package just ties the ribbon, right?

None of it is making logical leaps. It's a few assumptions but this timeline comes naturally from all of the news reported and from what team members have said.

Besides, it would not be sensible in a budget cap era to build the launch spec W14 as well as they can and then suddenly plan such extensive changes to fundamental components such as suspension at round 5 of the season, and have it planned out to such an extent that they knew they would do this even before running in preseason.. if they knew these problems existed prior to preseason they wouldn't have built them into the launch W14.

The merc's first sidepod/engine cover just didn't look like something they'd spent a ton of time on. Just like their Barcelona preseason testing sidepod in '22.

Makes sense. The scaling issues that were rumored probably happened in the winter, before Bahrain.

[PlatinumZealot]

I dont believe it is scaling doesn't make sense to be scaling. You have say a hundred peice model, if one part is not scaled properly, the model simply wont come together. If you are taking about scaling of measurements then this would be revealed with some sort of calibration done before testing.

A tolerance problem is what I believe was happening...

[TimW]

More likely it is just the correlation with the wind tunnel data, and the fudge factors to make them match not working on the correct parameters. Red Bull had similar issues in 2017 and it took them quite a while to sort it out as well.

RB getting it right is not necessarily 100% based on skill, there is also luck involved. With a change of aero regulations, if your models work perfectly that saves you a lot, if you find out that they don't, you have a hill to climb like Merc is doing.

It would be an incredible achievement if they manage to match RB this year, since their car is always compromised by the chassis and impact structures being designed for a different aero concept. They will surely make a step once they address that next year.

[InsaneX_Badger]

More likely it is just the correlation with the wind tunnel data, and the fudge factors to make them match not working on the correct parameters. Red Bull had similar issues in 2017 and it took them quite a while to sort it out as well.

RB getting it right is not necessarily 100% based on skill, there is also luck involved. With a change of aero regulations, if your models work perfectly that saves you a lot, if you find out that they don't, you have a hill to climb like Merc is doing.

It would be an incredible achievement if they manage to match RB this year, since their car is always compromised by the chassis and impact structures being designed for a different aero concept. They will surely make a step once they address that next year.

I'll be incredibly surprised if they manage to be within 2-3 tenths pure pace by the end of the year regardless of track characteristic.

[PlatinumZealot]

If they are within two tenths then it means the car is actually 4 to 5 tenths slower. That Max is only pushing as fast as he needs to go.