Mercedes trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin said the team’s failure at the start of the 2022 season came as a “bit of a shock” to Lewis Hamilton.
In the year The team became a dominant force in Formula 1 in 2014 when the Sport introduced V6 hybrid turbo power units. He won all eight constructors’ championships between 2014 and 2021. During this time, drivers Hamilton and Nico Rosberg won seven titles. At the same time, Mercedes won 111 of the 160 Grands Prix held.
Introducing new ground-effect cars for the 2022 season, however, Mercedes struggled with Red Bull and Ferrari’s excessive aerodynamics and were let down by their aggressive W13 chassis. After the first 20 of this year’s 22 rounds, Mercedes are currently unbeaten, just one pole away from Georg Russell in Hungary and on course for their fewest podium finishes in the V6 Turbo era.
Mercedes improved its performance during the season, with Hamilton finishing second behind Red Bull’s Max Verstappen at the last two rounds in the United States and Mexico. However, Shovlin said Mercedes’ lack of performance at the start of the season had cost him the team’s champion driver.
“Lewis is always working hard, highly motivated and wants to strive to win,” Shovlin explained. “It was a bit of a shock for him to go from the competitive position we’ve had in previous years to a heavy car at the start of the year.
“[It was] For most of the early part of the year, we have to make a lot of compromises with the car, trying to get the best out of it, so that we can adapt to compete effectively in the pack. Then learning at the same time. But I think, like us as a team, Lewis can definitely see that we’re going in the right direction.
As the season progresses and Mercedes catch up with their rivals, Shovlin says the team knows what they need to do to get back to the front next year.
“We can see a clear path for the police to get back to a level where we can compete and win,” Shovlin said.
You can see Lewis’s commitment to the team as we get closer and closer to helping us reach those goals and his commitment to working alongside him.
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