Discover how Shovlin and Hamilton transformed the problematic W15 into a racing success at Mercedes F1.
Lewis Hamilton’s victory at Silverstone was clearly not a flash in the pan. This was evidenced by the Briton’s superb performance the following weekend at the Hungaroring, securing third place, followed by a win in Belgium—a one-two finish for the team at Spa, even though George Russell was ultimately disqualified.
The Mercedes F1 W15 is no longer a diva, and Lewis Hamilton must finally stop constantly battling against it. The direct consequences are visible on the stopwatch. Lewis managed to outqualify George Russell twice in the last four races (compared to only once before that).
Andrew Shovlin, chief race engineer at Mercedes, provided technical details on the dual recovery: that of the Mercedes F1 and of Lewis Hamilton himself.
“At the start, Lewis might have found the car more challenging to handle.”
“One aspect we’ve improved with the car is arriving with good setups in FP1; it’s a solid foundation for beginning to develop performance and fine-tune it. This significantly aids the weekend.”
“At the beginning of the year, we were making relatively minor changes, and suddenly, we’d lose the balance of the car and really struggle. So, this has certainly helped us. And it’s probably fair to say that in the early races, Lewis had more difficulty tuning his car than George.”
As Shovlin confirms, the recovery of Mercedes F1 is not just about evolution. It also involves tuning and engineering.
“We always thought this car seemed fast… But being able to do that throughout an entire weekend was somewhat challenging for us at the start of the year.”
“Today, it’s easier to handle. It’s not due to a single development; it’s a series of things we’ve done to try and solve these issues. We were surprised not to be faster initially. We thought we had built a good car, and fundamentally, it was a good car. It just had a few issues that we needed to resolve, and now we are seeing the results of this hard work.”
Has Lewis Hamilton also evolved his driving style, particularly in comparison to George Russell?
“There is a certain driving style that suits these tyres. We tend to find that the two drivers are never very far apart in terms of settings. Once the car is in a good window, the same thing works quite well for both, and between sessions, they study what the other is doing to try and find where the gains are.”
“Throughout the year, they have worked together. Initially, neither of them (George Russell and Lewis Hamilton) wanted to finish where we were, and they were able to help each other by trying different experiments with the settings and driving style. They were able to assist each other by trying different experiments with the settings and driving style. And overall, you progress as a team, and that’s how a team with two drivers functions.”
However, not everything is rosy, Shovlin concedes. There is still a gap to Red Bull and McLaren F1.
“First and foremost, for us, it’s a matter of progress. If you look at where we were in Austria, in terms of race pace, we were fortunate that Max Verstappen and Lando Norris ran into each other, but we were quite far from that battle.”
“In Budapest, the gap has narrowed, so you can see we are making progress, but before this weekend, we knew that the hot conditions, the twisty nature of the circuit were going to be challenging for the rear tyres.”
“The benchmarks are really McLaren and Red Bull, but the key for us was to be better in Budapest than in Austria and who knows what we will have here, at Spa, where qualifying could take place in the wet. Sunday starts to be dry, but the track will not be as good as at Silverstone.”
Will the new parts at Spa finally help to reduce this performance deficit? The new floor was ultimately removed after the first day in Belgium.
“Let’s now talk about the developments… One of the most important things is the floor, which is just another step of development that we have been able to bring.”
“It’s good to have new parts on the car because the reality of capped budgets means you are constantly patching them up, trying to repair them, so I hope this will be a step forward.”
“We’ve also made subtle modifications to the front and rear wings to reduce the car’s drag to suit the long straights, but the big new feature is the floor. It’s not really a breakthrough, as we’ve always thought this car was fast. We need to better analyse the Spa data to see how to best use it after the break.”
“Being able to do this over an entire weekend was somewhat of a challenge for us at the start of the year. It’s more usable now, and we’ve done a lot to try to resolve these issues.”
Hamilton acknowledges struggling with the settings
Lewis Hamilton, the Silverstone victor, admits to having struggled with the settings early in the year.
But the hardest part came next: how did he manage to overcome these issues?
“Just keep exploring and trying. We’ve tried so many settings configurations.”
“Ultimately, you have to understand that it’s not always bad, but it’s about working with people who can make a difference. It’s about communicating with my team members, being as detailed as possible in the debriefs so that nothing gets lost in translation.”
“We go back to the simulator, we work on it, we return to the factory. I make sure we are aligned. We go to the wind tunnel and make sure that the people working on these improvements feel like they are with you on the road and that you understand exactly everything they are doing and the steps they have followed to get there.”
“That’s what we’ve done, and it’s so much more rewarding because if you show up every weekend with a car that you have to drive, if you are part of the entire development process in the background, it’s even better when it finally gets to where you want it to be.”
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Mercedes F1’s W15: From Diva to Dominator in Detail Mercedes F1’s W15: From Diva to Dominator in Detail. f1 2024 Mercedes F1’s W15: From Diva to Dominator in Detail
