Formula 1 Miami GP
Mercedes has no answer on Miami GP performance loss
Mercedes Formula 1 technical director Mike Elliott admits that the team doesn’t understand why the W13 lost performance across the Miami Grand Prix weekend after a promising Friday.
Adam Cooper
Edited: May 14, 2022, 3:45 AM
Copy link
Share on Viber
In FP2 George Russell was fastest and Lewis Hamilton was fourth, suggesting that the team had found something that worked at the Miami track.
However, neither driver was able to repeat that sort of form from Saturday onwards, as other teams were able to extract more pace from their cars. They eventually finished Sunday's race in fifth and sixth places, with Russell ahead of Hamilton.
Russell complained that porpoising into corners had been a particular problem at the Florida track.
When asked about the performance loss across the weekend Elliott conceded that Mercedes was at a loss to explain it.
"That's a really good question and it's a question that we are trying to answer at the moment," he said in a Mercedes video debrief.
"I think if you were to look at Friday's running it was probably the most competitive we've been at any point through the season so far.
"Between Friday and Saturday we will have made some changes and actually those changes were fairly minor, but there were also changes in conditions and we need to go through all of that data, extract as much understanding as we can from that and use that to move forward over the next couple of races."
Elliott noted that efforts to control porpoising are progressing in parallel with the already planned performance development programme.
The front wing updates brought to Miami as part of the latter worked as intended.
"I think it is important to differentiate two things," he explained. "One is the normal upgrade path and the other one is fixing the issues that we are having with bouncing and other things that are compromising the performance.
"So, the wings that we brought definitely brought us the performance that we were expecting and were a step forward.
Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes W13, George Russell, Mercedes W13, Fernando Alonso, Alpine A522, Esteban Ocon, Alpine A522
Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images
"The experiments we were doing on track trying to understand the bouncing, we gathered a lot of data, we gathered a lot of data on Friday when we had strong performance and we gathered data through the race and as always, the engineers are pouring through that, gaining understanding.
"In fact, every time we run the car we learn something new and that is the aim of the game, the game is to try and understand the car faster than our competitors."
Elliott stressed that a lot of activity is ongoing at the team's Brackley base to improve the W13.
"Although at the moment we are on the back foot a little bit with that, there is a huge amount of effort, a huge amount of work going in trying to understand how we improve the car, how do we find that next little step forward, how do we get rid of the bouncing and how do we get back to being competitive or competitive relative to the front-running team, which is where we want to be," he added.
Read Also:
- Alpine CEO: Alonso’s Miami F1 penalty "difficult to accept"
- Norris: McLaren needs ‘a little bit more’ to fight Mercedes, Alfa Romeo
- Why first year loss hasn’t dented Miami F1 boss' outlook
Reflecting on the race, he also noted that Hamilton's car wasn't damaged in the first lap contact with Fernando Alonso in Miami.
"The contact was wheel-to-wheel and as always, we have lots of engineers looking at the data that is pouring off the car," he said.
"So the aerodynamicists are looking at pressure taps on the floors and wings, they are looking at the push rod loads and our chief engineer will be looking at all the other suspension loads and making sure that they are doing what they are supposed to be doing.
"So, we can very quickly tell whether there is an issue with the car and there was no issue to find."
We want your opinion!
What would you like to see on Motorsport.com?
Take our 5 minute survey.
- The Motorsport.com Team
Read and post comments
Read also :
Share Or Save This Story
Copy link
Share on Viber
Previous article Norris hopes FIA learns from Miami F1 barrier call after crashes
Next article Why Miami’s first F1 race could never live up to its mega hype
Top Comments
There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?
View More & Comment
More from
Adam Cooper
RB: Tsunoda “mentally on a different level” in 2024
Formula 1
Formula 1
Japanese GP
RB: Tsunoda “mentally on a different level” in 2024
Andretti planning F2 and F3 entries to promote US talent to F1 team
Formula 1
Formula 1
Andretti planning F2 and F3 entries to promote US talent to F1 team
Andretti F1 team formally opens new Silverstone facility
Formula 1
Formula 1
Andretti F1 team formally opens new Silverstone facility
Latest news
IndyCar veteran Sting Ray Robb secures United Autosports Asian Le Mans seat
IndyCar
Indy IndyCar 1 h
IndyCar veteran Sting Ray Robb secures United Autosports Asian Le Mans seat
Five things to look out for at the F1 Mexico GP
Formula 1
F1 Formula 1
Mexican GP
3 h
Five things to look out for at the F1 Mexico GP
Every time NASCAR took a win away due yellow line violations
NASCAR Cup
NAS NASCAR Cup
Talladega II
3 h
Every time NASCAR took a win away due yellow line violations
Max Verstappen sits out for Red Bull in Mexico GP FP1
Formula 1
F1 Formula 1
United States GP
4 h
Max Verstappen sits out for Red Bull in Mexico GP FP1
Feature
Discover prime content
Subscribe and access Motorsport.com with your ad-blocker.
From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.
You have 2 options:
- Become a subscriber.
- Disable your adblocker.
Subscribe now Already subscribed? Sign in here
Already disabled your adblocker?
Reload page
Manage Alerts
Subscribe