Tag: mercedes f1 team

Pirelli – Full statement over Mercedes tyre test

Pirelli also issued a statement today about the three day test carried out in Barcelona with the Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 team.

Here is the full statement:

Milan, 31 May 2013 – Pirelli, in development testing with teams carried out in 2013, has not favoured any teams and, as always, acted professionally, with transparency and in absolute good faith. The tyres used were not from the current championship but belonged to a range of products still being developed in view of an eventual renewal of the supply contract. Further, none of the tests were carried for the purpose of enhancing specific cars, but only to test tyre solutions for future championships. The use of the car utilized by Mercedes, in particular, was the result of direct communication between FIA and the team itself. Pirelli did not ask in any way that a 2013 car be used: not of Mercedes nor Fia nor the teams which, during the year, were offered the opportunity of participating in tests for the development of tyres for 2014. The tyres that will be tested by the teams in the free practice at the Montreal Grand Prix have never been used by the teams before. With regard to the new tyres, the problem of delamination has been solved by Pirelli’s technicians exclusively through laboratory testing. Delamination, which only occurred on four occasions and always because of on-track detritus, has never put the drivers’ safety at risk, but does risk harming Pirelli’s image. This is why the company decided to intervene.

With regard to the rules which govern its conduct, the company has always respected the contractual limits which bind it to the FIA, teams and championship’s organizers, and has always respected the principles of sporting loyalty.

Pirelli, however, feels the need to reaffirm the indisputable need to carry out tests for the development of tyres which are adequate and regulated by rules which are clear and shared by all the interested parties. The company confirms its availability, as communicated to the teams many times in the past, to organize tests for the development of tyres for 2014 with all the teams in the championship.

PIRELLI’S ANSWERS TO FIA

With regard to requests for information received from FIA, Pirelli promptly provided the answers needed to clarify what happened at the tests, as far as its own responsibilities went.

DEVELOPMENT TESTS FOR 2014 TYRES WERE OFFERED TO ALL: NO FAVOURTISM

The tests were conducted in observance of the contract between Pirelli and FIA, which gives the supplier the possibility of carrying out tests for the development of tyres with each team of up to 1,000 kilometres, without specifying the type of car to be used, nor sanctioning the simultaneous presence of all the teams for the running of the tests. In this regard, Pirelli has since 2010 made it clear that it is neither possible nor useful to carry out this type of test with all the teams simultaneously. In fact, this type of testing aimed at technological development and researching new solutions, involves many tyres of different types which must be tested with a single car at a time. Testing for championship specifications is different, as occurs in winter testing which require the participation of all the teams, so as to find the most satisfying solutions for all the cars in the competition. For this reason, Pirelli insists on the need for winter testing under conditions which are truly representative of the situations which will be met during the championship.

Already in March 2012, Pirelli sent an email to all the teams, FIA and FOM, inviting the teams to indicate their availability for testing for the development of tyres for 2013. Further, the company explained that it was necessary to conduct the tests with the teams’ cars because it did not have a suitable one of its own (Pirelli has the use of an adapted 2010 Renault and, before that, a 2009 Toyota).

The invitation was subsequently repeated in various official contexts and repeated to some teams last March for the development of tyres for 2014.

THE TEST CONDUCTED IN BARCELONA WAS FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF TYRES FOR 2014 AND NOT FOR THE MODIFICATION OF 2013 SPECIFICATIONS

This test, as always, carried out with a single compound never used in a championship, regarded structures not in use in the current season and not destined to be used later during the 2013 season. The tyre tests were conducted “in the dark”, which means that the teams had no information on which specifications were being tested or about the goal of the testing; nor did they receive any type of information afterwards.

May 31, 2013
FIA calls Mercedes and Ferrari F1 teams for further investigation into tyre testing

According to a statement released by the FIA this evening, the Mercedes and Ferrari F1 teams have been called to supply further information for a disciplinary inquiry over the recent “secret” Pirelli F1 tyre test that took place in Barcelona.

The recent uproar was initially focused around the secret Pirelli test carried out by Mercedes after the news broke during the Monaco Grand Prix weekend.

Ferrari and Red Bull Racing lodged a protest against Mercedes using their current 2013 car in the test at Barcelona immediately after the Spanish Grand Prix. The stewards then referred the matter to the FIA.

It has since emerged that the Corse Clienti, Ferrari’s customer car division provided a 2011 car for a Pirelli tyre test two weeks before the Mercedes test took place.

This evening, the FIA issued a statement saying that the Formula One Governing Body wanted both Mercedes and Ferrari to participate in the investigation surrounding the tyre testing.

Their statement read as follows:

“The FIA has asked Team Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 and Scuderia Ferrari Team which have taken part in tyre tests in the 2013 season to reply to a disciplinary inquiry in pursuance of the FIA Judicial and Disciplinary Rules,” said the statement.

“This follows the Stewards’ Report from the Monaco Grand Prix and represents supplementary information required by the FIA in the light of the replies received from Pirelli, who were asked for clarifications on Tuesday May 28.”

It was previously believed that running the tyre tests with a 2011 car was within the rules but it now seems that this could be doubt as it could be argued that the 2011 car is not “substantially different” from the 2013 car as is required by Article 22.1 of the F1 sporting regulations.

May 31, 2013
Monaco Grand Prix Preview Quotes: Mercedes F1 team

Here are the Monaco Grand Prix Preview Quotes from the Mercedes F1 team:

Nico Rosberg: Monaco is always a fantastic weekend and it’s great to race in the city where I live. Knowing that all my family and friends are watching makes it very special and I love being able to drive from home into the paddock on a scooter! The surroundings definitely make Monaco the coolest track on the calendar and the atmosphere over the weekend is great. I have good memories from the race last year after finishing in second place and I hope we can get another good result this time around. At the moment we have a good car for qualifying which helps in Monaco as it’s the most important qualifying session of the year as track position is so important. So that might be helpful for us but there are so many unknowns, especially with the tyres, so we will just have to wait and see.

Lewis Hamilton: Whilst there hasn’t been a lot of time since Barcelona, we’ve been working hard to put the disappointment of the last race behind us and focus on the opportunities ahead. Monaco is one of my favourite races of the year and I love driving the streets there. As a driver, you know that you have to perform on every single lap and it’s a challenge that I really enjoy. It’s a real experience to see the barriers flashing past at high speed and I love the fact that the fans can get so close to the track making for a great atmosphere. Perhaps more than at many other tracks, qualifying and getting the best possible track position is crucial in Monaco, but we have to keep our focus on Sunday as well and keep working to improve our race pace. Everyone is working really hard and I know we can get there. We just need to keep motivated and work it out together.

Ross Brawn: Monaco is a not usually a race to which teams bring many updates because the track conditions change so much across the weekend. The priority is always to get the drivers comfortable with the unique challenge the circuit presents and to give them a set-up they feel confident pushing to the limit. Both Nico and Lewis have historically been incredibly competitive in Monaco and this weekend will certainly allow their talent to shine. The engineering team will be focused on getting the most from our car on the slow, bumpy layout and there will of course be particular emphasis on achieving tyre consistency and durability. Meanwhile, our work continues back at Brackley and Brixworth to fully understand the reasons for our below-par race performance in Barcelona, in order to develop the right solutions for the upcoming circuits where high tyre usage could once again be a limitation for us.

Toto Wolff: Monaco is the most famous race in our sport and a special moment of every Formula One season. The narrow streets will give our drivers the perfect opportunity to display their talents and, historically, the team’s cars have performed strongly there in terms of pure speed. However, it is clear to everybody in the team that, while we have a strong car right now, we are not able to use that performance properly on Sunday afternoon. Although overtaking in Monaco is difficult, we cannot afford to be complacent in terms of tyre management and we will need to do significantly better than we managed in Barcelona in order to score a strong result. We have only scored points with one of our cars at the past three races and this is something we must improve quickly, beginning next weekend in Monte-Carlo.

May 22, 2013
Mercedes F1: Silver Arrows in the grey

There’s been plenty of talk amongst Formula One fans lately about the terrible form of the Mercedes F1 team. They’re performing really well over one lap for qualifying, but when it comes to race pace they’re just falling flat on their faces. Reynard Gelderblom wrote in to share his thoughts on the problems over at the Mercedes F1 team.

Silver Arrows in the grey

Three consecutive pole positions, front row domination and statistics favouring the front row starters at the Circuit de Catalunya. Still, Petronas Mercedes AMG F1 fell away like the American economy on Black Thursday.

In the Chinese Grand Prix Lewis Hamilton managed to salvage a podium. Not that this is much to write home about considering he started from pole. A week later in Bahrain Nico Rosberg again had the statistics in his advantage, but yet again he could only secure ninth with Hamilton at least salvaging some honour with a fifth place. After the three week break, the F1 circus moved to the traditional gateway to the European part of the season – Barcelona.

With all teams utilizing the opportunity to improve the cars closer to home and race at the only pre-season test venue slotted into the calendar, Mercedes was looking forward to converting pre-season pace into race winning performance. Back in February during their launch, the team promised that the 2013 season will be the start of the next phase in their evolution – the return of the championship contending Silver Arrows. To back that up, they arrived in Spain with a car that included a little bit more silver than grey. Performance, however, still proved to be a grey area that outshone that silver lining. Despite their dominant showing in qualifying, Rosberg had to settle for sixth with Hamilton finishing a lowly twelfth – managing to pass a Williams as one of his highlights of the day.

Where do the problems lie? Both Rosberg and Hamilton are more than competent drivers. For three years Rosberg has been faster than Michael Schumacher – granted this wasn’t the Schumi of old, but still. Hamilton is a former World champion with McLaren and except for choosing the wrong pit box, he’s really started to look like the driver who burst onto the scene back in 2007.

Tyres have been a great concern for Mercedes, but this isn’t a problem that just affects them. To some degree everyone has struggled with the tyres. Sebastian Vettel may have been very critical about them after Barcelona, but then again, Vettel and Red Bull have been competitive on days when Mercedes have just faded away.

There certainly is no shortage of funding and knowledge in this team. All this brings me to one question: Are we seeing yet another Toyota here? They used to have a bigger budget than Ferrari and certainly enough resources to build the next shuttle, yet none of that materialised into anything worth writing home about on the circuit.

I have been looking forward to a Silver Arrows revival ever since Sauber took to Kyalami in Free practice in 1993 with the “Concept by Mercedes-Benz” writing on the side. This was echoed by the McLaren livery change in 1997.

In 2010 I was smiling when Mercedes purchased the Brawn team. Mercedes is indeed on the platform to regain the glory years. All the components are there, they just need to present the complete package. I hope that day comes sooner, rather than later.

Reynard Gelderblom is the motorsport editor for Street Motion.

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May 17, 2013
2013 Spanish Gp – Mercedes leaves Lewis & Nico in the dark

Lewis Hamilton was left scratching head after his Mercedes team’s showing at the 5th round of the world championship in Spain at the 2013 Spanish Gp.

An utterly dominant Saturday surprised the paddock and looked to set to stand the Rosberg and Hamilton duo in good stead for Sunday’s main event. But despite taking their third pole position in as many race the Mercedes drivers were found wanting in the race.A front row start meant nothing as first Hamilton then Rosberg were unceremoniously shuffled through the field. The age old problem of tyre wear shattered any designs the two may have had on the podium much less victory and left Lewis Hamilton with more questions than answers.

“Today I was doing absolutely everything the same as I did in Bahrain. But I had no grip, I couldn’t push, and if I did, the tyre just went off immediately. I’m absolutely lost today. I don’t know what went wrong,” a perplexed Hamilton admitted.

It wasn’t any better for pole starting teammate Rosberg either.”It was really difficult out there, but why? Why on one lap are we so fast and on a long run so slow? It’s strange, and it’s not just one axle, it’s front and rear. Both are struggling and there’s no explanation.”

Some suggest that the coanda exhaust system and overheating of rear tyres could be the culprit in Mercedes’ struggle with tyre wear. But it begs the question if the problem is so obvious why hasn’t it been fixed?

Mercedes will again be regarded as favourites come qualifying at Monaco but the question remains – what about the race?

May 12, 2013
Spanish F1 Grand Prix Preview Quotes: Mercedes F1 team

Here are the Spanish F1 Grand Prix Preview quotes from the Mercedes F1 team:

Nico Rosberg: I’m looking forward to traveling to Spain next weekend. We know that the car went very well at the Circuit de Catalunya in pre-season testing so I am hopeful that we can have a strong weekend. We will have to wait and see how our pace compares however. I’ve been in the factory for a couple of days this week, on the simulator and meeting with the team, and everyone has been working hard to make progress on our race day performance. It will be an interesting weekend and once we see how everyone performs in Barcelona, it should give a good idea of how the rest of the season will look.

Lewis Hamilton: It feels like a long time since Bahrain so we’re all looking forward to getting to Barcelona next weekend and starting to get into the routine of the European season. The short break has been good however, and I’ve had the chance to catch up with family and friends, and also spend some time at the factory with the guys, working on our efforts to improve. We’ve been boosted by the results that we’ve had at the start of the season and to come away from the first four races with two third and two fifth places feels like a real achievement. I’m feeling very comfortable in the car now and we know the areas that we need to improve so a lot of effort is being put in to close that gap to the front-runners. Barcelona should be a good test as we know the circuit so well having completed most of the pre-season test programme there. The weekend should be a good benchmark of the progress we have made since then.

Ross Brawn: In the two weeks since we returned from Bahrain, there has been a lot of hard work taking place in Brackley and Brixworth to prepare for the start of the European season in Barcelona next weekend. We have focused our efforts in two key areas; finalising our upgrade package for Spain and understanding our comparative lack of race pace in Bahrain. We have made progress in the latter area and will evaluate some developments over the upcoming race weekends to help improve the situation. We’re not there yet but we are making progress and of course, performing in the race is what really counts. The Circuit de Catalunya is a circuit that we know well and we have a lot of data from the two pre-season tests to help prepare for the weekend. However in the late spring conditions, we can expect the track to be of a very different nature to what we experienced earlier this year. Overtaking is more difficult there than at some of the early season tracks and, of course, every team will be bringing new developments so the weekend should provide an interesting challenge.

Toto Wolff: The three-week break between the Bahrain and Spanish Grands Prix was welcome, as it gave us extra time to analyse in detail what happened at the last race. We have built a good picture of our varying levels of race performance and why we under-performed overall in Bahrain. In Barcelona, we will test some solutions aimed at improving our tyre management in addition to our planned upgrade package. The circuit itself is well known as a benchmark for aerodynamic performance and we performed strongly there at the end of winter testing. The track conditions and temperatures will be very different on the race weekend, though, so we must dial the car in to those circumstances. Our target is to improve our Sunday afternoon performance to match what we have delivered on Saturday in the past two races. It will certainly be interesting to see what gains everybody has made since the last time we were at the circuit and how the planned upgrade packages work from car to car.

May 3, 2013