After a bruising triple-header, Mercedes looks to reset its season, with Allison confident the worst mechanical woes are behind them.
Mercedes F1 hopes the recently concluded triple-header encompassed the worst of what the team will face, after enduring three mechanical failures and one crash. James Allison, the team’s Technical Director, referenced the book The World According to Garp during his debrief and explained why.
“The main character of that book, Garp, bought his first house based on the fact that a light aircraft had crashed into it,” Allison explained. “He considered the house to be pre-disastered and therefore believed that nothing bad would happen to it in the future.”
“So, if you look at these three races, you could say we have been pre-disastered with unexpected retirements caused by very mature components, which we would never have expected to fail. Hopefully, we’ll have better luck going forward.”
Nonetheless, Allison was pleased with the damage control in Barcelona, attributing it to lessons learned from the two previous races. “I think the most important thing across these three races is that we got it wrong in the first two in terms of how we set the car up.”
“We overworked the rear axle, which had negative consequences, and we approached Barcelona with a different mindset. We approached Barcelona with a different mindset. And on a track that would have killed our tyres had we treated it the same way we did Imola and Monaco, we managed to be more like ourselves.”
“Looking ahead, knowing that we can do more of this kind of thing and lean more into that in the upcoming races, I think that’s a positive.”
Antonelli’s engine failure in Barcelona is unrecoverable for the remainder of the season, and this concerns the British engineer, who acknowledges the challenge of managing components.
“This puts pressure on the pool. We could install a new power unit for the next race weekend without incurring a penalty, as we are still below the maximum number of units allowed per season without a penalty.”
“But of course, we’re only a third of the way through the year… well, a bit more. So this is going to strain the rest of the pool if we’re to make it to the end of the season.”
“So we’ll have to think about how to best use the remaining resources. But yes, it’s obviously not great when a power unit drops out of the pool before reaching its full life.”
He also expressed concern for Antonelli’s confidence. “Kimi is young and full of youthful optimism, but I know for a fact that our failures during this period have affected him. Two retirements, one due to a chassis issue, the other to an engine problem, all within just three races. It’s a tough pill to swallow.”