© Stephen Reuss for Mercedes-Benz Grand Prix ltd.
Lewis Hamilton says Mercedes “now have the wider sidepods more in the direction of Red Bull, and it’s not been my decision to go that way”.
Much has been said about Mercedes’ ‘zero sidepods’ concept, introduced at the beginning of 2022, with most observers agreeing it was a failure.
The team still decided to keep it in 2023, but after a poor performance at the first race of the season in Bahrain, they announced they will be going in a different development direction.
This culminated with Mercedes’ first big upgrade of 2023, which was introduced in Monaco. One of the most noticeable features of the upgraded W14, was the introduction of more conventional sidepods.
Lewis Hamilton has been a big critic of the team’s old development direction, but he reveals the switch to wider sidepods was not his decision.
“We have had a lot of input as a team over the past year,” he said.
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“Those constant conversations of ‘why does that look like that and we look like this, have we tried that?’
“We now have the wider sidepods more in the direction of Red Bull, and it’s not been my decision to go that way.
“It’s been clear since we dropped the car back on the ground in the first test, it’s been the identical twin to last year’s car, except for the bouncing.
“We have taken note of where we are and where we have gone wrong, so are slowly chipping away back to the front.
“It’s just a long process,” Hamilton concluded.
