Mercedes make key W15 discovery with ‘immediate’ work now underway

Lewis Hamilton leads George Russell in Mercedes formation

While Mercedes believe they made the breakthrough of finding a more “stable platform” with the W15, the hard work has only just begun as the team has uncovered a pair of major threats to said platform.

Mercedes endured another challenging race weekend at the Japanese Grand Prix, Lewis Hamilton qualifying P7 and George Russell P9, with those proving to be their finishing positions, Russell ahead of Hamilton this time at the chequered flag.

Mercedes discover wind and temperature impact on W15

Despite the disappointment of that result, team boss Toto Wolff was trying to ensure a positive outlook on the situation, referring to their Suzuka outing as “testing”, and it seems that this has led to an important breakthrough in their understanding of the W15.

Speaking as part of Mercedes’ post-Japanese Grand Prix debrief, trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin said the key aim of the weekend was to make the W15 more “predictable”, which they achieved, only they found that a change in the wind or track temperature would take it back out of said desired operating window.

And so with a free weekend to come before the Chinese Grand Prix, there is no time to waste for Mercedes as they look to eliminate this issue.

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“The big program we were looking at was to try and get the car a bit more predictable through the weekend,” said Shovlin.

“What we found is that we can get it in a window but if the wind changes, the track temp changes, it quickly falls out of it and that was leading to poor performance in race and qualifying.

“Now there’s no doubt that we’re not where we need to be at the moment, we know that and we know that we’ve got work to do, but certainly working with the car across the weekend was easier, the balance of the car was more consistent, there are issues that we need to get on top of and get on top of quickly.

“But certainly, we seem to have a more stable platform, one where its behaviour through the whole weekend is more consistent, but as I said, we know that there’s work to do and we’ll be working on that immediately.”

Mercedes depart Suzuka P4 in the Constructors’ Championship, just one point ahead of Aston Martin and now 35 adrift of McLaren a position ahead.