“No one anticipated Mercedes’ extreme interpretation of the rules,” Ross Brawn opines on the modified W13 for Bahrain Testing

Mercedes F1 team has caused a stir by bringing an extremely peculiar sidepods design to Bahrain testing. F1’s motorsport boss Ross Brawn has admitted that no one anticipated that Mercedes was going to come out with an extreme interpretation of the rules that were laid down ahead of the 2022 season.

As per the Twitter post by The Race F1’s Managing director, Ross Brawn has always maintained that any designs that circumnavigated the aim of the regulations in improving the raceability of the cars will be liable to be outlawed.

Brawn has noticed Mercedes’s new design and has labeled it as ‘impressive’ on part of Mercedes.

“It’s a very extreme interpretation of the regulations, and I think there’s going to be a lot of inevitable debate about their interpretation.”

“That’s what happens with new regulations: however hard you try to close off the options – and, believe me, we closed off hundreds of them – the innovations in F1 are always extreme.”

Ross Brawn on how they are looking at the Mercedes situation at the moment

“From our perspective, it’s largely about, does it affect the objective of the regulations? The teams want to be sure that no team has taken an interpretation which they feel is correct. I think there will be a lot of debate.”

Brawn has also indicated that it is far too early to make an opinion on whether the Mercedes sidepod design in any way is going against the intention of the new regulations. However feels, if there is a perception that the design is giving Mercedes a performance advantage, then the F1 and FIA would have to tread lightly before making a decision.

In the past, we needed everybody to agree to a change in the season but now you can make a change with 80% of the teams agreeing as long as the FIA and F1 also agree

“So I think once the interpretation Mercedes has made has been understood, then we can get a balanced view on its impact and what impact it’s going to have.”

“Spirit is such a grey area. At the end of the day, you have to go on the wording of the regulations. But that wording can be changed with an 80% team majority, we can change the wording.”

“If something has slipped by, then the teams are aware that that can happen. So that could happen live during the season so we’ll have to see how this one plays out.”

It seems that the F1 hierarchy is going to keep a close eye on the working of the Mercedes team during the three days of testing and are going to play the waiting game. No matter what happens the other teams are going to demand an explanation and this situation could very escalate further in the coming days.

Also Read: Christian Horner alleges Mercedes of ‘violating the spirit of the regulations’ and claims the rival car ‘is not legal’