F1 News

Mercedes say reliability is a concern for sure

Mercedes say reliability "is a concern for sure"

28-02-2020 15:11

Lewis Hamilton says that the Mercedes unreliability is a concern to the team after he stopped on track on Thursday with a sensor issue, cutting off the engine. Mercedes' reliability in 2019 was bulletproof as the team powered him towards a sixth title last season, but they have had a few issues in pre-season testing this year.

Hamilton has still been able to complete several laps over the two weeks and Mercedes will go into the 2020 season as favourites, despite their issues. Williams suffered a few issues with their power units before Hamilton conked to a halt midway around the lap yesterday afternoon.

The issues will be frustrating for the team, and Hamilton admitted the team are concerned, telling reporters in Barcelona: “It’s a concern for sure. Normally in this pre-season testing we’re much more confident in the reliability, so it’s not been perfect for us. I think we’re on our second engine already.

"It’s not been perfect and we’ve found that we’ve got plenty of problems that we are trying to iron out. I don’t know how long it will take to iron out but that’s never a bad thing necessarily to discover them through testing.

“It’s definitely not an easy or relaxed scenario for us but I have every confidence in the guys back in the factory that they will analyse and do the best they can in the next two weeks to make sure we start off on the right foot."