2023 Mercedes-AMG | Petronas F1 Team

[dans79]

Last year we were told many times that they were often experimenting. I have not heard much if any talk in this regard this season.

https://formulapassion-pro.ey.r.appspot ... iluppi-w14

It's summer, and while it's vacation time for mere mortals, the Formula 1 teams work twice as hard. In fact, not only are there the grands prix, but in the factory we think about what to do in the immediate future: continue to develop or focus on 2024? In Mercedes there is a lot of decision on the subject. Both team principal Toto Wolff and technical director James Allison believe a third way is necessary: ​​to invest the remaining budget cap to improve the W14, but with components deemed applicable also to next year's car.

Wolff's words
“ We have no choice. These placements are not our goal, we want to get back to the top and win the championship. It won't happen this year, so we need to look to 2024 , using the next races to learn and develop the W14 in order to have the improvements on the next car as well .”

Allison: 'Developments for both seasons'
The Austrian team principal's opinion was substantially endorsed by Allison: “ We're only halfway through the season and there's still a lot to develop on these cars . All the teams will obviously turn their attention to next year and this will put us in a bit of a crisis in terms of how quickly we can improve our cars .”

“ There are definitely improvements we would like to make to the W14 – we know they will apply to next year as well. The feeling is that with these updates, both seasons are invested . As far as we're concerned, there will still be developments, and I think also on the other cars. This upcoming series of races will see a bit of a change of position in a tight-knit pack – upgrades will make all the difference for one team, until another upgrades in turn to even the score. We'll see how everything settles down in the last part of the season: let's hope we can have a good second part of the season and have our noses ahead ”.

[Hammerfist]

Not the biggest believer in writing off seasons tbh. How did basically writing off the 2021 season when a championship was still on the line work out for Mercedes? I'm sure they learned from that. You learn a lot by seeing and developing the actual car on track, so imo they should still keep pushing. Unless they had a completely different concept for next year I don't see the need to abandon the W14 and solely focus on next year.

[AR3-GP]

Not the biggest believer in writing off seasons tbh. How did basically writing off the 2021 season when a championship was still on the line work out for Mercedes? I'm sure they learned from that. You learn a lot by seeing and developing the actual car on track, so imo they should still keep pushing. Unless they had a completely different concept for next year I don't see the need to abandon the W14 and solely focus on next year.

I only meant writing off a season, when it's clear you are nowhere. They were at times 2 seconds per lap slower than the RB in Bahrain. Toto called it one of the darkest days in motorsport history for them. That is complete write off territory. If Merc had gone to complete mule car territory from that point, they'd be benefitting from more wind tunnel allocation now.

That's very different to 2021. I never said they should have written off 2021. They were competitive at the season opener in '21.

Compared to last season, we have not seen Mercedes splitting the car configurations and testing different things with each driver during the GP or drivers announcing that they are running more sensors than their teammate. The experimentation seems much less this year.

[Hoffman900]

The big thing missing here is there are millions on the line for constructor finishes. Sinking your season will cost you millions that has to be made up via sponsors or the parent company, do that often enough and you start getting cut off. There is also no garuntee that if you sink your season that you will be competitive next year, and furthermore, doing so enough will hurt morale and effect the quality of your recruitment of engineering talent.

The teams are interested in profit making as well. It is a business after all.

[AR3-GP]

The big thing missing here is there are millions on the line for constructor finishes. Sinking your season will cost you millions that has to be made up via sponsors or the parent company, do that often enough and you start getting cut off. There is also no garuntee that if you sink your season that you will be competitive next year, and furthermore, doing so enough will hurt morale and effect the quality of your recruitment of engineering talent.

The teams are interested in profit making as well. It is a business after all.

You have to see the big picture. Committing to a prize money loss is equivalent to buying more WT hours. If a team could pay for more WT hours, would they not do it? Especially a team which previously could afford to spend 500 million in a season. A little sunk cost for more WT hours would certainly be digestable.

The previous arguments that were given is that the budget cap is bad because if not for the cap, Merc would just spend their way out of this deficit. Well, they could effectively do the same thing, by foregoing some prize money in exchange for WT hours.


Both Aston Martin and Mclaren have basically executed this maneuver.

[dans79]

I only meant writing off a season, when it's clear you are nowhere. They were at times 2 seconds per lap slower than the RB in Bahrain. Toto called it one of the darkest days in motorsport history for them. That is complete write off territory.

Cooperate might tolerate a distant second, but no way are they going to be happy with 5th or 6th or 7th, or worse!

[AR3-GP]

I only meant writing off a season, when it's clear you are nowhere. They were at times 2 seconds per lap slower than the RB in Bahrain. Toto called it one of the darkest days in motorsport history for them. That is complete write off territory.

Cooperate might tolerate a distant second, but no way are they going to be happy with 5th or 6th or 7th, or worse!

Then they are holding the team back from exploring more strategic opportunities to gain performance.

[Hoffman900]

You would have to make a convincing argument to give up millions of dollars. Accountants and other corporate bean counters don’t see the world like diehard racing fans who spend their extra time / energy arguing on a forum do.

Furthermore, if you do, you have to make assurances that it will actually pay off and there is no guarantee. For every Mclaren and Aston Martin, there is a RedBull who effectively have had similar CFD / WT hours as Merc and are far ahead at the end of a race. If I was a bean counter I’d point that out in a meeting.

Walk into a meeting and tell corporate to give up millions with no guarantee of success and you’ll be laughed out the door.

[Just_a_fan]

The big thing missing here is there are millions on the line for constructor finishes. Sinking your season will cost you millions that has to be made up via sponsors or the parent company, do that often enough and you start getting cut off. There is also no garuntee that if you sink your season that you will be competitive next year, and furthermore, doing so enough will hurt morale and effect the quality of your recruitment of engineering talent.

The teams are interested in profit making as well. It is a business after all.

You have to see the big picture. Committing to a prize money loss is equivalent to buying more WT hours. If a team could pay for more WT hours, would they not do it? Especially a team which previously could afford to spend 500 million in a season. A little sunk cost for more WT hours would certainly be digestable.

The other big picture is making sure that your design tools are working correctly. No point dropping this year and going all in on next year's car if you're not certain that the tools will make competitive parts. So they've decided to check the correlation by bringing stuff this year that can be used next year too. So although they'll lose a bit of WT time next year, they've effectively bought some back by using the first part of this season to design and check ideas and their tools.

That should mean they go in to next year's car with more confidence. We'll have to wait and see, of course.

[AR3-GP]

You would have to make a convincing argument to give up millions of dollars. Accountants and other corporate bean counters don’t see the world like diehard racing fans who spend their extra time / energy arguing on a forum do.

Furthermore, if you do, you have to make assurances that it will actually pay off and there is no guarantee. For every Mclaren and Aston Martin, there is a RedBull who effectively have had similar CFD / WT hours as Merc and are far ahead at the end of a race. If I was a bean counter I’d point that out in a meeting.

Imo, if Aston Martin and Mclaren can profit from excessive WT hours, then Mercedes can too. I would anticipate Mercedes are capable of doing the same kind of laptime improvement with the same kind of WT hours. They have a decent aero team that is currently hamstrung by a starting block error and limited WT time. Their problems are aerodynamic in nature, not PU, or reliability. This can only be resolved with more time in CFD and the WT.

[Hoffman900]

You would have to make a convincing argument to give up millions of dollars. Accountants and other corporate bean counters don’t see the world like diehard racing fans who spend their extra time / energy arguing on a forum do.

Furthermore, if you do, you have to make assurances that it will actually pay off and there is no guarantee. For every Mclaren and Aston Martin, there is a RedBull who effectively have had similar CFD / WT hours as Merc and are far ahead at the end of a race. If I was a bean counter I’d point that out in a meeting.

Imo, if Aston Martin and Mclaren can profit from excessive WT hours, then Mercedes can too. I would anticipate Mercedes are capable of doing the same kind of laptime improvement with the same kind of WT hours. They have a decent aero team that is currently hamstrung by a starting block error and limited WT time. Their problems are aerodynamic in nature, not PU, or reliability. This can only be resolved with more time in the CFD and WT.

I’m not going to claim I know what happens in F1 board rooms, but in my experience elsewhere, trying to convince the corporate board / investors / stakeholders that giving up millions with no guarantee of success is a sure way to get fired.

For example:

Hours in wind tunnel Number of tunnel tests Wind on Time (hours)
Red Bull 756 605 151
Ferrari 900 720 180
Mercedes 960 768 192
Alpine 1020 816 204
McLaren 1080 864 216
Alfa Romeo 1140 912 228
Aston Martin 1200 960 240
Haas 1260 1008 252
Alpha Tauri 1320 1056 264
Williams 1380 1104 276

So you need to convince a board that giving up a position or two for millions of dollars is effectively worth one working week in the wind tunnel and that’s all you need. If I’m the board, I’m saying “well RB has less time than you and they’re still beating you, so what makes you think you can produce a RB beater with only one more working week of wind tunnel time?” And “if you couldn’t do it then what makes you think you can do it now?”

Furthermore, there is likely a sliding scale with sponsors in terms of payout. So it’s not just the purse from Liberty that’s likely on the line.

[Hammerfist]

Not the biggest believer in writing off seasons tbh. How did basically writing off the 2021 season when a championship was still on the line work out for Mercedes? I'm sure they learned from that. You learn a lot by seeing and developing the actual car on track, so imo they should still keep pushing. Unless they had a completely different concept for next year I don't see the need to abandon the W14 and solely focus on next year.

I only meant writing off a season, when it's clear you are nowhere. They were at times 2 seconds per lap slower than the RB in Bahrain. Toto called it one of the darkest days in motorsport history for them. That is complete write off territory. If Merc had gone to complete mule car territory from that point, they'd be benefitting from more wind tunnel allocation now.

That's very different to 2021. I never said they should have written off 2021. They were competitive at the season opener in '21.

Compared to last season, we have not seen Mercedes splitting the car configurations and testing different things with each driver during the GP or drivers announcing that they are running more sensors than their teammate. The experimentation seems much less this year.

So write off the season in bahrain and embark with a new concept you will have no idea will actually work until preseason testing 24’? I dont think that would have been a goid idea.

[AR3-GP]

Not the biggest believer in writing off seasons tbh. How did basically writing off the 2021 season when a championship was still on the line work out for Mercedes? I'm sure they learned from that. You learn a lot by seeing and developing the actual car on track, so imo they should still keep pushing. Unless they had a completely different concept for next year I don't see the need to abandon the W14 and solely focus on next year.

I only meant writing off a season, when it's clear you are nowhere. They were at times 2 seconds per lap slower than the RB in Bahrain. Toto called it one of the darkest days in motorsport history for them. That is complete write off territory. If Merc had gone to complete mule car territory from that point, they'd be benefitting from more wind tunnel allocation now.

That's very different to 2021. I never said they should have written off 2021. They were competitive at the season opener in '21.

Compared to last season, we have not seen Mercedes splitting the car configurations and testing different things with each driver during the GP or drivers announcing that they are running more sensors than their teammate. The experimentation seems much less this year.

So write off the season in bahrain and embark with a new concept you will have no idea will actually work until preseason testing 24’? I dont think that would have been a goid idea.

Is that not what every single team did during '21 in preparation for a completely new car for '22? Mercedes now has the advantage of having seen what works and what doesn't.

[Hoffman900]

I only meant writing off a season, when it's clear you are nowhere. They were at times 2 seconds per lap slower than the RB in Bahrain. Toto called it one of the darkest days in motorsport history for them. That is complete write off territory. If Merc had gone to complete mule car territory from that point, they'd be benefitting from more wind tunnel allocation now.

That's very different to 2021. I never said they should have written off 2021. They were competitive at the season opener in '21.

Compared to last season, we have not seen Mercedes splitting the car configurations and testing different things with each driver during the GP or drivers announcing that they are running more sensors than their teammate. The experimentation seems much less this year.

So write off the season in bahrain and embark with a new concept you will have no idea will actually work until preseason testing 24’? I dont think that would have been a goid idea.

Is that not what every single team did during '21 in preparation for a completely new car for '22? Mercedes now has the advantage of having seen what works and what doesn't.

How much are you planning on sinking the team?

RedBull had the second least WT / CFD time heading into 2022 and the least this and next year, and have a car that is far and away better.

In terms of wind tunnel time and CFD time the differences aren’t drastically different. Merc has already spent $275mil and hundreds of hours in CFD and wind tunnel time trying to make their concept work. 40 more hours here or there isn’t going to fix it. Especially when they publicly claim they have tried the other winning concept and don’t know why it works.

Toto Wolff, and Mercedes shareholders, just increased their net worth substantially due to the team’s current evaluation. They’re not interested in losing tens of millions of dollars so they can get a week of wind tunnel and CFD time with no guarantee of success (Ferrari and Alpine have been doing that forever now). Formula One is a for profit business. These people are all in it to make money and sinking their fortunes for a “maybe” is going to be a non-starter, rich people don’t get / stay rich off maybes. You would be the most foolish engineer on the planet to make the pitch that we should sink the team and “you” (the investors) are going to lose a lot of money for no guarantee off success. You would probably have to go into hiding after when it blows up in your face and Sir Jim Ratcliffe wants to turn you into synthetic fuel

Furthermore, you can bet you start sinking the team sponsors are going to want a chunk of their money back.

[AR3-GP]

So write off the season in bahrain and embark with a new concept you will have no idea will actually work until preseason testing 24’? I dont think that would have been a goid idea.

Is that not what every single team did during '21 in preparation for a completely new car for '22? Mercedes now has the advantage of having seen what works and what doesn't.

Toto Wolff, and Mercedes shareholders, just increased their net worth substantially due to the team’s current evaluation. They’re not interested in losing tens of millions of dollars so they can get a week of wind tunnel and CFD time with no guarantee of success (Ferrari and Alpine have been doing that forever now). Formula One is a for profit business. These people are all in it to make money and sinking their fortunes for a “maybe” is going to be a non-starter, rich people don’t get / stay rich off maybes. You would be the most foolish engineer on the planet to make the pitch that we should sink the team and “you” (the investors) are going to lose a lot of money for no guarantee off success. You would probably have to go into hiding after when it blows up in your face.

Furthermore, you can bet you start sinking the team sponsors are going to want a chunk of their money back.

1) The shareholders can't "cash in" until they actually sell shares. Seeing as I do not see that happening, it's value that they can only look at through a glass window. You can look, but you can't touch...

2) A few seasons ago, they were happy to burn money faster than it could be printed.

I don't buy that there is no appetite for a few million in losses which can be taken in the big picture, if there can be a good reason to incur them. I think you are underselling the value of WT time in an aero formula. PU if frozen. This is now the only area where you can make a difference. No one is saying they should finish 10th in the WCC. P5 in the WCC is a good spot with a sufficient WT hours advantage, with a reasonable cost to prize money delta.

Also, if someone needs assurances that 30% more windtunnel time will catch you up, just tell them that if we can't do it with 30% more, then how could we do it with 10% more?