At least Mercedes is happy with the improvements in Miami

How difficult this 2022 season is for Mercedes. Ultra-dominant since 2014 and the start of the hybrid era, the German team is having a very complicated start to the campaign. Accustomed to playing the leading roles, the Silver Arrows find themselves in a no man's land since they are far behind Ferrari et Red Bull but ahead of the rest of the peloton. A situation that has lasted since the first Grand Prix in Bahrain last March.

However, last weekend in Miami the sky seemed to clear with an in-form George Russell signing the 2^e and 1^e time of the first two free practice sessions. Very good news for Toto wolff and his team who introduced the first major developments (front and rear wings) on the W13. Ultimately, it was all just a mirage for the Germans given the rest of the meeting where the Silver Arrows were unable to confirm the trend.

Despite this lack of competitiveness during the Grand Prix on Sunday for example where Lewis Hamilton and George found themselves behind the four leading cars, namely the two Red Bulls and the two Ferraris, and once again in front of the rest of the field, at Mercedes we are trying to see the bright side of things.

« It is important to differentiate two things: one concerns normal evolutions and the other concerns the resolution of the problems we encounter with porpoising and other things which compromise the performance of the car, says Mike Elliott, Mercedes technical director. The fins we brought definitely gave us the performance we were hoping for and allowed us to take a step forward. We were able to collect a lot of data on Friday when we were performing well and also to understand the porpoising. Engineers will look at this data to better understand.

Every time we run the car we learn something new and that is the aim of the game. The game is to try to understand the car faster than our competitors. Although right now we're a little bit behind, there's a huge amount of effort, a huge amount of work to try to figure out how to improve the car, how to take the next little step forward, how to get rid of the porpoising, how to regain competitiveness or be competitive with the leading team, the one we want to be."

ALSO READ > Russell laments “a fast car, but no key to unlock performance”