© Jiri Krenek for Mercedes-Benz Grand Prix Ltd.
Mercedes’ Andrew Shovlin says “if you want to win, and you want to win races and world championships, you don’t get there by copying everyone else’s design”.
In 2022 Mercedes introduced an innovative car concept with minimal sidepods. This was in stark contrast to what other teams were doing, especially frontrunners Red Bull and Ferrari.
It was soon evident that the W13 was not able to challenge for race wins, and Mercedes had to embark on a year-long mission to try and figure out how to improve the car’s performance.
Some have even suggested that Mercedes should completely change their concept and do something similar to their rivals. Trackside Engineering Director Andrew Shovlin says this option was never on the table.
“Most of the engineering, certainly from the aerodynamic point of view, a lot of it are the bits you can’t see under the floor, that is where a lot of that work is,” the Briton said.
“The sidepod concept was something that we had to commit to anyway for the year realistically.
“But if we’d been more focused on just trying to find a quick fix, we may have been copying and rolling it out and seeing what it does.
“The goal for us though was always to try and understand it ourselves and learn and find our own path, because if you want to win, and you want to win races and world championships, you don’t get there by copying everyone else’s design.
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“All our other cars have had pioneering features on them, they had clever ideas. We have tried to be leading with the technology, so we’ll carry on doing that.”
However, it was not just the sidepods design that made Red Bull perform as well as they have, it’s also their low-drag concept, which helped give their car impressive top speed.
Mercedes on the other hand suffered from high drag, but Shovlin says they were never focusing on straight line speed.
“When you’ve got a completely new set of rules, it’s difficult to know where everyone is going to design to. [Red Bull’s] car looks like it has less drag if we put the same wings on it.
“In the earlier part of the year, we were having to run very high [downforce levels], which was certainly not helping from that point of view.
“But if you look at Brazil, we didn’t have the fastest car, but we could overtake them and we were able to get the 1-2.
“So making it quick in a straight line is not our highest priority. And one of the fastest in a straight line is the Williams.
“So it doesn’t define your performance level, but when you are very similar, obviously, it’s a nice advantage to have.
“So it’s something we’d like to fix. It’s just that the priority will always be the base performance of the car and getting that in the right place.”
Mercedes’ car also suffered from excessive porpoising, and Shovlin says the team is aware that as they add more downforce to their 2023 car, the problem could return. However, they believe new floor edge rules will help overcome most of these issues.
“The more you load up the floor, the more you can trigger those problems. Where we have made very good progress is in the straightline.
“So back in Imola, Jeddah, Bahrain, all those early races, the car was bouncing really badly at high speed. And we managed to get a really good handle on that.
“There were still issues we got when the car rolled in a fast corner and the floor gets to a point where it’s touching. And that can cause a bit of unsteadiness.
“But the rule changes for next year will help that. Fundamentally, though, they’re not going to make the problem go away. They’ll make it a bit easier for the teams.
“But we’re hopeful that the work we put into the learning and the understanding in the early part of the year will help us at least develop to a good baseline next year,” the Briton concluded.
