Toto Wolff questioned on Mercedes’ controversial sidepod issue

The sidepod design on the Mercedes F1 car has been a talking point all year - and after McLaren’s sudden rise, it is back in the spotlight.
Mercedes AMG F1 W14 sidepod. Formula 1 World Championship, Rd 7, Monaco Grand Prix, Monte Carlo, Monaco, Preparation
Mercedes AMG F1 W14 sidepod. Formula 1 World Championship, Rd 7, Monaco Grand Prix, Monte…

From nowhere, McLaren were faster than everyone except Red Bull in qualifying for the F1 British Grand Prix, then backed it up with 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Lando Norris finishing second.

Their upgraded MCL60 was likened to a Red Bull by168澳洲5最新开奖结果: Lewis Hamilton and Toto Wolff.

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It is a different concept to the one that Mercedes threw their weight behind at the beginning of the year, and Wolff has again been question🌠ed if his team will follow suit and use the same design that works so well for their rivals.

💙“We had the sidepod concept and the bodywork💝 in the tunnel very early on already to see which avenues it would open up,” the Mercedes team principal said. 

“And how much it would add to performance, an🦋d💝 the relative loss of downforce, the way we measure it, was substantial. 

“So it’s🦄 not something we wanted to fo🍸llow up earlier in the year. 

“Will we change our design direction? I think we have a great group of aerodynamicists, led by James [Allison], and I’m sure it will be a consideration s♋eeing the step they [McLaren] did. 

“The sidepods and the bodywork arꦫe just one part of the chassis and clearly it looks like there are interesting solutions that open up. 

“But most of the performance comes from the floor and the diffuser aꦛnd we haven’t seen how they’ve interpreted the regulations and how they’ve done it. 

“So in my opinion, it’s just the package. 

“We see that the strong cars all look a lꦍittle bit the same when you look from the side and from top down. 

“Certainly that has played in our minds a🐓lready back in the day, but maybe tha💧t’s just a little more indication where it goes.”

Lewis Hamilton (GBR) Mercedes AMG F1 W14 celebrates his third position in parc ferme. Formula 1 World Championship, Rd 11,
Lewis Hamilton (GBR) Mercedes AMG F1 W14 celebrates his third position in parc ferme. Formula…

Wolff was asked how imp꧑ortant ♎wind tunnel and CFD time is to developing the W14.

“I didn’t want to refer at all the reasons for the perfor♋mance to the wind tunnel time, I just think it’s just good engineering, good decisions,🐼 work well together on the right track,” he answered. 

“We need to see whether they can repeat that performance in Budapest, which is obviously the op𒉰posite in what you need. 

“But this sport is about marginal gains. If you have 20 percent more wind tunnel time and allocation and you gain two seconds over the year, that means four tenths or fifth teams🦋 in additional performance, which is always going to help. 

“But still, we need to have the right innovation and design it the right way, put it on the car and it needs to🌺 correlate with the car and the wind tunnel. So chapeau!”

F1ꦕ returns in Hungary on July 23 where McLaren will be hoping to remain ahead of Mercedes.

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