James Allison on the strategy for updating cars at Mercedes

      Dominating at the start of the season, Mercedes is not progressing as quickly as its competitors, but they see no reason for concern. The team's technical director, James Allison, spoke in the Nu Silver Arrows Radio podcast about the chosen approach to updating the car…

      James Allison: “From an aerodynamic perspective, the pace of progress in the wind tunnel this year is very high – about six to seven times higher than last year. The car is gaining about half a second every two months. This is extremely cool progress. And we did everything possible to prepare the most competitive car by the start of the season, implementing all the solutions we found.

      Thank God, it worked out. A key point of our development strategy was the internal decision to lock in the aerodynamics and chassis as late as possible, a few weeks later than usual. As a result, our plan did not allow for any time buffer.

      By implementing this plan, we maximized all opportunities, putting them into the car by the first race, completely exhausting all our reserves.

      Perhaps other teams locked in their car designs earlier, which is why they were able to prepare and present their first updates sooner. Now our development program is lagging one to two races behind the update cycles of other teams.

      Judging by the lap times, everyone is moving in roughly the same direction. Each is gaining about half a second every two months. If you fall behind by half a step in the development cycle, it means that the half-second advantage we had at the beginning of the year can completely disappear in one update cycle. This is unpleasant, but you understand that our update is just a matter of time.

      Our strategy is simple: to stay ahead and ensure that the next efficiency boost restores the previous level – bringing back all the advantages we achieved at the beginning of the season.”