Valtteri Bottas and Toto Wolff talk about Mercedes stopping development of their current car, with Bottas saying there are more upgrades expected.
Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff said on numerous occasions that the team has stopped developing their current car, to focus on the development of the 2022 challenger under the new F1 regulations.
Now he explains what led to that decision, and why it’s a decision Mercedes needed to make.
“You always have to balance the sport’s interest versus the long term,” said the Austrian.
“Next year’s regulations are going to be with us for a few years. You can’t just ignore it because if you have a deficit at the beginning of next season, that could take a long time until you catch up.
“So we always stick to our strategy. In a way, we didn’t change course, we kept on our paths.”
Wolff also confirmed that Mercedes will not be developing any new aerodynamic updates.
“In terms of aerodynamic development, we stopped a long time ago. The last development stopped in spring and the last upgrade that was then produced we brought to Silverstone.
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“And that upgrade functions, we have made a step forward,” concluded Mercedes’ team boss.
However, in an interview with Hypebeast, Valtteri Bottas says more improvements are still coming.
“The fact is that we’re not developing the current car anymore at the factory,” the Finn said.
“But there are still improvements to come, because obviously once you discover something in the wind tunnel, there’s a delay before you actually get the parts onto the track.
“So it doesn’t matter like this. We had some new parts in Silverstone and I hope that we’re going to have some more later on.
“But at some point that will have to stop, because obviously next year there’s a big regulation change and the team needs to balance out the car’s performance this year versus next year,” concluded Bottas.