Mercedes racing director Andrew Shovlin that the team’s growing momentum affects their plans for 2025, so the car for next season will probably be a close relative of the W15 car.
Over the past few months, the Brackley-based team has seen significant gains in performance. By doing so, the German team entered a constant battle for victory.
After becoming a record holder by winning eight consecutive constructors’ titles between 2014 and 2021, with the introduction of a new era of ground effect, the Silver Arrows deviated from the right development path.
However, after getting rid of the famous concept of ‘zero sidewalls’, Mercedes came to the necessary path that allowed them to finally move towards the positions they have been looking for for a long time.
Three victories in four races brought the long-sought car, so they put themselves in the foreground towards the end of the first part of the current season. Such a development allowed Mercedes to already look towards the development of the car of the same concept for the following year, because it is the last season of the current rules.
“Given that recent developments have been successful in delivering the performance we were hoping for, and next year’s car is likely to be a close relative of this year’s car, we are now more confident that we can carry this momentum into next year. More than we were in previous years,” said Shovlin.
Mercedes has a reasonable path to finding performance
The current form of Mercedes is a striking departure from the way the team started the current season. After the first eight races, two fifth places for George Russell were the highlight for the German team.
However, starting with the 26-year-old’s podium at the Canadian Grand Prix, Mercedes has reached the podium in the last six races, with 3 being the top podium.
As a result of that. Shovlin believes that the team finally managed to understand and come to grips with their difficulties at the beginning of the season, despite the frustration of the presented car, which was not up to standard.
“The baseline was not very good,” he explains when citing the cause of Mercedes’ poor start to the season.
“Did a good job of understanding the problem and solving it. Clearly, we now have a reasonable path to finding performance.”
“The frustration is that it was the third year in a row that we presented a car that was not as good as we should have been. But we learned a lot through this process,” added Andrew Shovlin.
