Damon Hill urges Mercedes to abandon the current season and set sights on challenging Red Bull in 2024
Formula One veteran Damon Hill advises Mercedes to throw away rest of the season to catch up with former rivals Red Bull
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Damon Hill
After a lack of performance, Mercedes brought major updates to their car to stand a chance against the rampant Red Bulls. It is no secret that Mercedes has fallen from grace after the new F1 ground rules were introduced in 2022. However, former F1 champion Damon Hill reckons that Mercedes should perform ‘badly’ to catch up to Red Bull.
“Ironically, the better Mercedes do the less scope they’ve got for the following year,” Damon Hill told the Sky Sports F1 podcast about the increased wind tunnel time. Hill said finishing lower in the standings could give Mercedes extra time at the ATR to develop the W15. According to F1 rules, the lower a team finishes, the more time their allowed to use the wind tunnel for developing their car.
“You’ve got Aston Martin who are benefitting, if you’d like, from a poor performance relatively from last year,” he further continued referring to the team’s swift success this year. “You kind of wonder whether Mercedes ought to be thinking about doing really badly between now and the end of the year,” stated the Brit.
Hill also mentioned the significance of extra wind tunnel time and its impact on a car’s performance. “I think when you’ve got a budget that you can spend it but you can’t because you did so well the previous season, then it kind of makes you wonder whether you ought to do really badly,” he concluded
After severe upgrades to the W14, will Mercedes look to sacrifice the rest of the season?
After dropping their zero-pod design, Mercedes finally caved in and decided to opt for more conventional sidepods. Along with sidepods, the Silver Arrows also tweaked their floor as well as the suspension of the car. All eyes were on the Brackley team when they first introduced their b-spec W14 at the Monaco GP.
Monaco was promising as the Mercedes’ finished in 4th and 5th place. At the Spanish Grand Prix, however, the new upgrades of the car shined. Lewis Hamilton came home in P2 and his teammate George Russel finished in P3, giving the team their best result. Although a double podium finish was a positive result, Hamilton finished 20 seconds behind the race winner Max Verstappen.
Mercedes, with a dream to bridge the gap with the Red Bulls, will certainly not look to hold back in performance. However, with the command Max Verstappen and Redbull have displayed seven races into the season, the Milton Keynes team is not showing any signs of stopping.
In case you missed it:
- Nico Hulkenberg urges Haas F1 team to focus on their race pace following a disastrous Spanish GP
- “It may be possible,” Helmut Marko responds to “shocking” claims over Red Bull winning all the races this season
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Justin P Joy
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