The Bahrain GP confirmed the fears of the eve for the Stuttgart house: the W14 is fourth force even behind Aston Martin. Lewis: “I said things because I know what a car needs, they should admit that.” Wolff: “We have to imitate Aston Martin”
09 March 2023
– sakhir (bahrain)
Mercedes was one of the negative surprises of this start to the World Championship. In reality, team principal Toto Wolff had already partially announced during the first pre-season tests that the data showed that the W14s were not on par with Red Bull and Ferrari. But the reality of the first race was even worse, the former rulers of F1 constructors from 2014 to 2021, even in this 2023 they struggle. And they were also reached and overtaken by Aston Martin, given that last Sunday both George Russell and Lewis Hamilton had to pay the price to Fernando Alonso. Hamilton finished 50 seconds behind the winner of the race that Max Verstappen who has already made even Ferrari tremble.
those first 10 laps
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If it was a bad awakening for the Cavallino, it was even worse for the Frecce Nere. Also because last year Stuttgart was the team that grew the most over the course of the season in an attempt to bridge the gap with Red Bull and Ferrari, to the point that Russell’s victory in Brazil also came in the last few races. Not that it was the sign of redemption, but looking at the winning cycle of the previous years, it seemed the best premise for a 2023 of a completely different tenor. Instead, ready-go and the W14 is already struggling, but not only on its opponents, on itself! Impressive sequence of the first 10 laps of Lewis Hamilton’s race in Bahrain. Compared to the first 10 laps of 2022, the Englishman was only faster than last year on lap 10, when he lapped in 1’40”289 compared to last year’s 1’41”581. From the second to the ninth lap, however, as can be seen from the table below, Hamilton has always been slower than himself, a worrying fact for the Stuttgart technicians to say the least.
hamilton disappointed
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Lewis didn’t hide his disappointment and perhaps some nervousness at the podcast Checkered Flag of the BBC, in commenting on the defeat in Bahrain, that Mercedes “didn’t listen to me”. The seven-times world champion said regarding the problems with the car “last year there were things I told them. I’ve driven so many cars in my life. I know what a car needs and doesn’t need. I think that it’s really about accountability and admitting and saying, ‘Yeah, you know what? We haven’t listened to you. We’re not where we should and should be working.'” However, Hamilton tried to remain constructive: “We are still multiple champions, we didn’t succeed in 2022 and this year I didn’t understand what went wrong, but that doesn’t mean we can’t do well going forward”.
wolff: no load
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Toto Wolff had to take a bitter bite: “When you look at where we were at the end of 2022 it seemed that we had recovered a lot – he said after the GP – it seemed to be just a problem of which circuit was suitable for us and which was not. The reality is that the gap from Red Bull has practically doubled, if not tripled.” But what went wrong? “A bit of everything – said Wolff – we lacked downforce and when you lack downforce the tires slip, and if the tires slip it means you lose ground”. Now the road ahead is complicated because “to recover you need big steps forward, not the conventional ones that are obtained by adding a few points of aerodynamic load every week because this is what the rivals do too”.
conceptual breakthrough
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And so Wolff is alluding to a conceptual revolution, exactly as Aston Martin did. “They made this decision to revolutionize the idea and they’ve gotten so much better. The ambition is to do the same thing”. In Stuttgart they started thinking about alternatives already after the first tests, when it was realized that the 2023 project was not at the level of the best: “We examined other ideas and we didn’t stop – said Wolff – this was to have a open minded, we have already looked at several concepts. Change the technical staff? We don’t look at people, but at the problem to be solved. Otherwise, since I’m responsible, I should think that everything will be resolved by sending me away”.
March 09, 2023 – 10:17 am
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