Mercedes has a strong package according to Lewis Hamilton

As with most stables powered by the Stuttgart firm, the stable Mercedes experienced some difficulties for this last day of the Bahrain tests. For Lewis Hamilton, it was the W05's gearbox which acted up, cutting off the effort of the 2008 world champion to get the best time of the Williams FW36 by Felipe Massa. The Briton failed just two hundredths behind the Brazilian. But the Brackley team is on the right path according to Hamilton.

“I think we have a solid base package. » explains the former resident of McLaren. “But that doesn’t guarantee us to be among the leading pack. You can be almost sure that Ferrari will be fast and the chassis Red Bull will be extremely strong, even if they seem to struggle with their Power Unit. So it won't be surprising to have differences of a few hundredths in Australia. »

The British driver also believes that this off-season will have been one of the most complicated to manage. “Like all teams, we have encountered problems, and we still have a long way to go in terms of reliability and performance. Every time we ride, we find something new. It was important to accumulate the kilometers as much as possible before Melbourne. Either way, as the season goes on, everyone will make mistakes, you just have to hope to make as few as possible. »

The 2014 season of F1 will resume its rights on March 16 at Albert Park in Melbourne, Australia.

Discover the analysis of the last week of winter testing in Bahrain carried out by our special correspondents in issue 1950 of AUTOhebdo, available this evening at 22 p.m. in digital version on all platforms, and from Wednesday on newsstands.