Strict aero rules mean the AMG F1 team struggled to get the W15 into a usable performance window.
Lewis Hamilton‘s final year as a driver for Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 was rather underwhelming. We are long-term fans of #44 here at MBWorld, so to see such a performance from a multi-time world champ was frustrating and confusing. And apparently we’re now being told why he was off-pace for most of the season.
MotorsportWeek reported that the performance drop was not due to the driver, but due to the car. Lead Trackside Engineer Andrew Shovlin shouldered the responsibility, saying “The car hasn’t been quick enough, and that’s been the thing that we’ve been trying to solve.” The W15 is faster than the W14, which never won a race. So that speed mentioned by Shovlin was a reference to their past performance, but also the huge leaps in pace that teams like Ferrari, Red Bull and McLaren found in 2024.
Some may question this being a car issue based on Hamilton’s team mate. George Russell’s performance had the upper hand against his team mate in the same car. And while that’s true, it may be that the W15’s “fixes” simply sat better with Russell’s method of driving. Outside of data, one important thing in a car is driver confidence. If confidence is not there, the last few percentages of performance are very difficult to extract.
Remember the porpoising issues that plagued all Formula 1 teams when the current set of rules came out? Well, every team came up with a different solution to tame the wild ride. Shovlin mentioned the W15 was difficult to get in to a window of balance that a driver could feel comfortable with.
There were two wins for Hamilton this season, however, which spells a different story than qualifying sessions. But Mercedes was in a position of playing catch up. They were trying to get better performance from the W14 with the W15 blank slate. Unfortunately, that meant Hamilton was in chassis development mode for a large majority of the season.
Photos courtesy of MotorsportWeek, Mercedes
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