Mercedes: 'It’s useful because nobody’s working'

It has been two weeks since the last race in Formula 1. The teams have to lay down their tasks for a fortnight during this period, so everyone can take a holiday. Rob Thomas thinks this is a very important time.

Mercedes' Chief Operating Officer notes that the teams can make good use of the two weeks to pick up other things than tinkering with the car.

"It’s useful because nobody’s working we can do some of the essential maintenance tasks that we just can’t get on to during the normal calender of racing," he told on the YouTube channel of Mercedes. "We’ll work through the whole factory doing maintenance on all of the cooling systems, the heating systems. Everything that supporters the factory including lots of work in i twill get done during this period."

On a very rare occasion, the FIA is willing to scrap these weeks, as 2020 proved. "Last year we didn't have a shutdown probably for the obvious reasons we'd all been battling through covid. And the shutdown for last august was therefore cancelled. So having a shutdown this year is really important."

Battle between Red Bull and Mercedes

Mercedes is in contention for the world championship with Red Bull Racing this season. For the time being, both teams are very close to each other, so it promises to be an exciting second half of the season.