Should Mercedes step away from car concept? 'A week of testing thrown away'

At Mercedes, the panic is great. After being the dominant force in Formula 1 from 2014 to 2021, this season they are condemned to a role as third team in the rankings. Red Bull Racing and Ferrari both knew how to better deal with the new regulations, while Mercedes with a revolutionary concept caused themselves serious problems.

Indeed, in Bahrain, Mercedes suddenly found themselves with a car without side pods at the start of the test week, while in Barcelona they still had a car with side pods at their disposal. Gary Anderson, a former designer in Formula 1, thinks that Mercedes shot itself in the foot by only testing the new car in Bahrain, as he explains at The Race.

Mercedes seemed to have confidence

"When I first saw the ‘zero sidepod’ package, I thought Mercedes must be pretty confident in its research direction to go out on a limb and commit to such a different package with such limited pre-season testing." According to Anderson, this made them throw away the first three test days in Barcelona. So although the new design got all the attention, Anderson thinks Mercedes might have performed better with the package from Barcelona.

"I don’t think Mercedes needs to put the zero sidepod concept in the bin, but I would say that over the past few years when other teams were running high-rake cars, they all learned a lot about how to generate an aerodynamic seal along the sides of the floor." So, according to Anderson, Mercedes has clearly missed a beat on this, which means they now have to cut to the chase.

Problems need to be solved

Abandoning the season now and hoping for more time in the wind tunnel in 2023 could be an option for Mercedes, but Anderson also sees a downside to that possible plan. After all, they have to go all out in Brackley to solve the problems before they start developments on the 2023 cars. Otherwise, the reigning constructors' world champion will take this year's porpoising problems into next season.