Mercedes have been warned that they need to be “very careful” in how they deal with the momentum of Lewis Hamilton and George Russell, with the two drivers approaching the tracks in Singapore and Japan.
The team’s orders came into effect when Russell was ordered to give way to Hamilton at Suzuka last time out, while Hamilton was pushing for the same to happen at Marina Bay in the previous race, when both drivers were pushing for victory on the last leg.
But former McLaren and Aston Martin performance engineer and strategist Bernie Collins explains that, behind the scenes, the team will need to manage the situation carefully to avoid rising tensions – and that too with other teams in the net.
Mercedes ‘must be very careful’ as drivers clash closely
Responding to Anthony Davidson, former F1 driver and Sky Sports F1 podcast colleague, believing that Russell remains Hamilton’s “backup man” to some extent under the current Mercedes dynamic, Collins spoke about his experience. my experience of how pilots work behind the scenes to test their strength. to assert its superiority.
With Mercedes drivers generally so close together, she explains the steps teams can take to try to ease any growing tensions – and how drivers are part of a team but ultimately race for themselves again. But this requires a balance that Mercedes must find with its drivers.
“I think there are some interesting battles, obviously the Mercedes we’re talking about, but there are a few,” Collins explained.
“The Ferrari guys, the McLaren guys, they’re all the same, they’re very, very close. Interestingly, Fred Vasseur [Ferrari team principal] actually said something very interesting on the grid, he said:
“Both are never happy, the one who goes first is the happier one”, that is completely true.
“I found Lewis’s comments very interesting, especially after qualifying. I don’t think his qualifications are too different from the position he had in Singapore. “But in Japan he was ahead of George, and in Singapore he was about five places behind George, but I think actually his qualifying position was quite close – and he was a lot happier when qualified in Japan.
“So it’s very exciting and you have to be very careful, because motorsport is one of the only sports in which an individual athlete competes for his own benefit, but not necessarily always compatible with teammates.
“That’s also true for their crew, their engineers in the bunker wall, you have this dynamic where you have the central person, but then you have the person on the left with the agenda and this person be with other people, and you have to be very careful with all the information that comes to you.
“You especially don’t trust the information ‘I’m faster than him’ [in a race], and even if you ask ‘by how much?’ You always get an incorrect number. So you just have to be very careful.
“Some teams make a lot of internal rules about how they will handle this strategic situation when two riders compete, does the first one always get priority at the stops?” If they accidentally cut it, will they change the car later? There are so many different things.
“You really want your two guys to work together as much as possible, but you have to look out for their best interests, the first person they want to beat on the track is their teammate – and that’s it.” Stop. the team wants to beat.
“All members of the team
Leave a Reply