First crisis in 8 years: What's going on at Mercedes?

His daring jumps out of the plane quickly made Lewis Hamilton change his mind. The left-behind Formula 1 world champion was able to unwind before traveling to the next race in Australia while skydiving in Dubai. “It’s such a great way to clear your head, reorient yourself and focus on the week ahead,” the 37-year-old wrote to his 27,5 million followers on Instagram after ten parachute jumps. When he arrived in Melbourne, the Brit posted a photo with Mercedes teammate George Russell from the weight room.

And this image has symbolic power. “We still have a lot of work to do,” said Hamilton after the weak start to the season. In the World Cup duel between defending champion Max Verstappen (Red Bull) and leader Charles Leclerc (Ferrari), the former long-term winner is currently just an extra, his historic eighth World Cup title extremely far away. Hamilton wasn't even able to keep up with the Haas racing cars, which were so lame in the previous season, in Saudi Arabia. He came tenth and had to ask on the radio whether there was still a World Championship point for that. Hamilton is not used to this region with the Silver Arrows. An unusual situation “We were at the forefront for eight years. “It’s extremely painful to no longer be a part of it – and with quite a bit of time behind us,” said Mercedes Motorsport Director Toto Wolff. The constructors' world champion of the past eight years has to struggle with the completely new aerodynamic rules, which ensure that the car sometimes hops and therefore loses time. Anyone who finds the right ground clearance setting for their car will increase their chances enormously. The competitors Red Bull and Ferrari clearly managed this better in the first two World Championship races. “We won’t rest until we’re back at the front” Mercedes Motorsport Director Toto Wolff Of course, this challenges the ambitious factory team. “We won’t rest until we’re back at the front,” said Wolff. When we return to Australia, where driving has not been possible in the past two years due to corona, this Sunday (7.00 a.m./Sky), technical improvements to the cars of Hamilton and Russell are expected. What do these bring? Nobody knows that for sure. “I hope that the gap will become smaller,” said Wolff recently in Saudi Arabia, but at the same time he also spoke quite openly about “deficits in all areas”. The Austrian said it was “not fun at all” at the moment, but this “exercise in humility” should make his racing team even stronger in the long term. Problem is complex The problem with so-called porpoising is complex, Mercedes agrees on that. It is assumed that it is not just about the downforce that presses Hamilton's company car onto the ground on the straights until it briefly touches the asphalt and is thus pushed up again. “We don't understand our car as well as we did at the end of last year,” said lead engineer Andrew Shovlin, complaining about the lack of speed. The right path was already “taken, but the step wasn’t big enough.” Now it’s about “finding a solution more quickly.”

The challenge: While Mercedes is fighting the current difficulties, the competition can develop further. “We need bigger steps,” 24-year-old Russell also demanded: “It’s difficult to say exactly when it will be our turn.” As the successor to the Finn Valtteri Bottas, the Brit actually wanted to intervene in the fight for victories from the start and Hamilton make life hard. With 22 points, he is fourth in the World Championship and is already 23 points behind Leclerc, while Hamilton is a further six points behind in fifth. As third at the start in Bahrain, the 103-time Grand Prix winner was at least on the podium - that should once again become a permanent situation for the German car manufacturer. “The season is still incredibly long,” said Wolff.

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First crisis in 8 years: What's going on at Mercedes?

Mercedes was at the top of Formula 1 for eight years. Now times seem to have changed. This is an unusual situation for the German racing team.

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