Formula 1 preseason report No. 8: Mercedes

The team finished within striking distance of Ferrari for second in 2022, but that was more due to the Italian team’s collection of strategy errors and car failures than performing at the same level.

While the start of the Formula One season underway, we’re admittedly running a bit behind in some of our team preseason previews here at AutoRacingDigest.com.

So, even though we have the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix (March 3-5) now in our rearview mirror, our exceptional F1 expert, Gregg Fielding, continues to break down each of the 10 teams that will take part in the global chase for the championship. The focus of today's episodes are Alpine and Mercedes (with two more teams still to come).

Here’s the teams we’ve covered thus far:

* \Alpine F1 Team

* McLaren F1 Team

* Williams Racing

* AlphaTauri

* Haas F1 Team

* Aston Martin

* Alfa Romeo

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Back in 2010, Mercedes made its first appearance on the F1 Grid in 55 years, buying out a team that had seen success through several iterations (which included Honda), and had just won a constructor’s championship under the Brawn moniker.

The German team brought in Michael Schumaker, the greatest German driver in the history of motor racing, to pilot one of its cars, and countryman Nico Rosberg to be his teammate. The former champion never seemed to mesh with the team’s car, and the three Schumaker years were a lean period for the team, who had a best finish of fourth in the standings.

After Schumaker stepped away, he was replaced with Lewis Hamilton, who had seen similar struggles in recent years, but was still considered a young star in the sport.

For the next nine years, Hamilton and Mercedes would dominate, including eight straight Constructor Championships and six driver’s titles for Hamilton. It’s almost easy to forget that Mercedes won their eighth Constructor Championship just over a year ago in 2021, considering the team’s outrage over the strange interpretation of the rules that handed the Driver’s Championship to Max Verstappen.

But last year’s results couldn’t be blamed on rules or officials, as the porpoising problem that ravaged the drivers in the new generation of F1 cars hit Mercedes the hardest, making Hamilton’s season more about survival than conquest.

Rumors have run rampant for several years that the now 38-year-old driver, who owns virtually every record in the sport, could retire to pursue other interests. But despite being bounced like a paddleball for the entirety of last year’s campaign and failing to win a race for the first time in his 16-year career, Hamilton continues to be dedicated to pursuing even more trophies for his collection.

We’re now in a period of transition for Hamilton, Mercedes and team boss Toto Wolff. After a decade spent fighting one-on-one with another team for the top spot or more often simply having their two cars duel it out among themselves, they now need to figure out how to make up the gap to a Red Bull organization that was flat-out dominant last year.

The team finished within striking distance of Ferrari for second, but that was more due to the Italian team’s collection of strategy errors and car failures than performing at the same level.

The good news for Mercedes is that the porpoising issue, which caused the not-so-young-anymore Hamilton to emerge at the end of races looking like he’d been in a 5-hour drive home from vacation, appears to have been (mostly) dealt with, as an FIA mandate of a 15-millimeter height raise in the bottom of the car seems to have done the trick.

The bad news – early results show the car is still not in the same class as the Red Bull entry, and chasing down Max Verstappen for the driver’s title will be left to the realm of fantasy.

Based on the early results from the car, Hamilton was quoted as saying, “I wouldn’t say I’m bullish like I was last year. I would say just more cautious. Hopefully, we hit the ground running, but it’s not always the case. And I think we showed last year that, whatever we’re faced with, we can recover. So that’s what we’ll try and do this year.”

This is definitely going to come as a downer to fans of the Silver Arrows, who were hoping last year was just a one-year anomaly and 2023 would see a return to contendership.

George Russell was able to put up an impressive performance as the team’s second driver last year, bouncing his way to fourth place in the driver standings, and securing his first-ever race win in the season’s penultimate race. At only 25-years-old, Russell has had to be patient, spending his first three years with the back-running Williams team waiting for an opportunity. And now after finally getting to Mercedes, finding his new team unable to contend for the title. But there’s little doubting Russell’s ability at this point, and he fully expects to be part of a Mercedes championship at some point, even if it might take a few years.

As for Hamilton? He’s given no indication at 38 that he’s slowing down, and with 41-year-old Fernando Alonso not showing any drop-off, there’s no reason to believe Hamilton can’t keeps this up for several more years – if he wants to, that is.

Hamilton’s current contract expires at the end of this season and while an extension has been expected, the lack of an announcement has once again brought up the talk that he could retire – especially if he feels the car is not capable of delivering him an eighth World Championship.

Mercedes has been said to be considering only one possible replacement for Hamilton, McLaren driver Lando Norris. But Norris is under contract through 2025, and McLaren boss Zak Brown is not likely to make it easy for his driver to find an escape clause to his deal.

So, Mercedes’ best plan might be to get the car improved enough during the season to appear to be a contender and hope they can keep their star driver satisfied for at least two more years.

The man in charge of making that happen is another Brit, Chief Designer John Owen. He and the design team keep a low profile – in fact you can no longer even find them listed on the team’s website. Whatever talking needs to be done is handled by Team Principal and part owner Wolff, who has become a familiar face to American audiences through his frequent appearances on Netflix’s “Drive to Survive.”

Unfortunately for Wolff, he’s needed to undergo a character change, from the cocky and smiling head of a dominant team to showing anguish at the end of 2021 to dealing with the ongoing agony that was the team’s 2022 campaign. Wolff recently denied a claim from rival Red Bull’s Helmut Marko that the Mercedes car was porpoising once again, although he freely admitted that his team’s car was the slower of the two.

2022 Results:

Team finish: third place in the constructor standings, five hundred and fifteen points scored, thirty-nine points behind second.

Driver Results:

* George Russell: 4th Place in driver standings, 275 points scored, best finish – first (Brazil)

* Lewis Hamilton: 6th Place in driver standings, 240 points scored, best finish – second (three times)

Predictions for 2023:

I had originally planned to make the bold prediction that Mercedes would return to the top of the standings in 2023. However, recent events culminating in preseason testing have shown that to be unrealistic. While it’s hard to know anything for certain based on testing results if Mercedes is competitive with Red Bull at the start of the season, will be a major surprise.

I still think the group back at the team’s Brackley, UK facility is going to get this figured out sooner rather than later, and I wouldn’t be shocked to see them make up most of the gap during the season. But even if they do, by the time that happens, the gap in the standings will be too much to overcome in the races remaining, leaving them once again in third place for this year.

You can expect Hamilton to find his way back to the top step of the podium at least once and Russell to have his chance at the British National Anthem being played as well.