Lewis Hamilton Exposes Mercedes W14 Conundrum: "One Of The Worst Feelings"
In a candid revelation, Lewis Hamilton has shed light on the perplexing issues plaguing the Mercedes W14 car which has significantly affected his performance on track.
In the world of Formula 1, even the smallest of design flaws can significantly impact a team's performance. Mercedes, a team known for their dominance in the sport, faced this very challenge in the 2022 season. Despite successfully addressing their initial issues of porpoising and bouncing, the team soon realized that their ground-effects concept was fundamentally flawed, leading to a performance deficit in the 2023 season.
In the midst of these struggles, Lewis Hamilton, has revealed a major concern he has for the W14. He highlighted the front-biased cockpit position as a major concern, explaining that it made the car "harder to predict."
The forward seating position has meant it's difficult to truly understand the movement of the car in comparison to a more central position, and as you'd expect, this is detrimental to an F1 driver such as Hamilton.
Hamilton's Comments
“If you look at the past, I've always enjoyed an oversteering car.
“I don't know if people know, but we sit closer to the front wheels than all the other drivers. Our cockpit is too close to the front.
“When you're driving, you feel like you're sitting on the front wheels, which is one of the worst feelings to feel when you're driving a car.
“What that does is it just really changes the attitude of the car and how you perceive its movement.
“It makes it harder to predict compared to when you're further back and you're sitting closer, more centre. It's just something I really struggle with.”
Aerodynamic Discomfort
Hamilton also noted that the car's aerodynamic setup of the car has led to him losing confidence in the car.
“On top of that, we have an aero characteristic, which is too forwards rather than being rear sat down as you begin to turn and coming off the brakes then moving rearward.
“Or the other way around: we have one that's very forwards, very much on the nose early on and then shifts later on.
“So, it's doing the opposite of what we want and that's what we trying to fix.”
He continued:
“I listen to the team and that was a direction that they said that we should go. Had I known the feeling that I would have in it, it wouldn't have happened.
“It has to change for the future. 100%.”
The struggles continued for Hamilton, as he was out-qualified by teammate George Russell in Saudi Arabia. Hamilton attributed this to specific suspension setup tweaks made during a race weekend that better suited Russell.
“There's one specific thing we can change in the suspension, which you have to do on a Friday night [after practice]… you can't change it for the rest of the weekend.
“You're basically rolling the dice. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.
“I've done it in the past, sometimes it hasn't worked and sometimes it has.
“It worked great for George, and he did a great job. The thing that I was lacking in the race was a lot of front end, which that set-up gives you."
Despite these setbacks, Mercedes remains determined to overcome the limitations of the W14 design. With major upgrades en route for Baku, hopefully Lewis will find more confidence in the disappointing car.