Mercedes is preparing for the Canadian Grand Prix, which will be held on the Montreal circuit, named after Gilles Villeneuve, where there are long straights, just like the circuit in Baku.
In the previous phase, the Mercedes W13 car was not very fast on the straights, although there were no particular problems with this in Barcelona, for example, and James Vowles, the team’s chief strategist, explained why this is related.
James Vowles: “In Baku, some teams preferred to put the rear wings of the cars at a fairly small angle of attack – it was less than we expected. This was most noticeable on the example of Alpine and Red Bull, so they were clearly faster on the straights.
The Ferraris were also slightly faster than us, and the McLaren, AlphaTauri and Williams were all set up about the same as ours. Ultimately, it’s important to find the right compromise, because putting the rear wing on minimal pressure to go faster on the straights is impossible, because you lose a lot in the corners.
In Baku, compared to our main rivals, Red Bull and Ferrari, we lost the most there. Not on the straights, but only in the corners, and I’m sure that reducing the rear wing attack angle for the straights’ speed would have a negative effect on the overall results on the circle.
Perhaps we didn’t expect to lose so much in Baku, but this enabled us to learn a useful lesson. The circuit in Montreal is not that different from Baku. I think our car is still inferior in speed, and Red Bull and Ferrari will lead the way again. However, I assume that the difference in speed in qualifying in Montreal will be smaller than in Baku and will return to the previous level.
I have no doubt that at each of the next races we will take some small steps forward, gradually closing the gap with the leaders. The team is preparing some new solutions – we think they will help to take these steps.
I don’t think we’ll be able to make a leap forward, but we’ve got a pretty strong team, so we’ll gradually bounce back, and at some point already this year we’ll start a dispute for wins.
Source: F1 News
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