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W15 will look more like Red Bull but Hill doubts Mercedes aero department
Mercedes have only won one race since November 2021. The team who went through a dominant period now struggle to get their act together, but Toto Wolff's formation has promised improvement. From 2024 onwards, Lewis Hamilton and George Russell should be more competitive again. Damon Hill, however, doubts this.
With the W15 for 2024, Mercedes are moving more in the direction that made Red Bull Racing so successful in 2022 and 2023. They are moving away from the current concept, something that perhaps should have been done immediately after last season. Hill sees that the aerodynamics department is in charge, and he hopes that they will now succeed in their mission. However, he is far from certain of that.
"My anxiety is this, which has been the case for a long time, Mercedes' dominance really was down to their power unit. They had the best power unit for a very long time. And the aerodynamics were always slightly different to Red Bull's. And if you remember, towards the end of the previous Formula 1 regulations, they persisted with their relatively flat-looking rake on the car. In contrast, Red Bull had an absolutely huge rake," Hill told Sky Sports' F1 podcast.
Newey's high rake
More and more teams in the top class of motorsport opted for this high rake, a concept from Adrian Newey. "But Mercedes stuck persistently or doggedly with their own, they looked like they were running a different aero concept on their car in the previous regulations, and then along come a new set of regulations…What I'm saying is, has the Mercedes aero department missed a trick here?"
On top of that, according to Hill, Mercedes has lost several people in aerodynamics to other teams. Of course, people from other race teams have been recruited again, but the German team can't afford another season of being unable to fight for the world title.