James Ellison: We felt stupid

Mercedes technical director James Allison admitted that they felt it was foolish to find an aerodynamic solution to the car’s problems, having previously spent a lot of time looking for a mechanical solution.

James Allison: “Since the start of the year we’ve been bothered by the fact that the car looked good in slow corners, pretty decent in fast corners, but didn’t allow us to get good results in both at the same time.

In the last two or three races we have adjusted the car so that it now has a reasonable balance between high and low speed and in the corners.

These boring jargon words mean the rider can now rely on the front and rear axle in both fast and slow corners, from the moment he hits the brakes at the start of the corner, all the way to the apex and out the other side. This balance is very important: the driver needs to know whether the car will understeer or oversteer in a corner, and whether he can follow the trajectory.

After we found a solution, we thought, “Oh God, what fools we have been!” We should have suspected that much earlier. What we struggled with all year long using springs, rods and other mechanical elements, we were able to solve very easily with the new front wing using aerodynamics.

It’s very easy to get distracted by the consequences, forget the cause and say to yourself, “If we address this little thing, everything will be fine.” The result was that we worked on things that actually made the car better, but weren’t the biggest problem.

I think this season we will definitely be able to make the car competitive and not be afraid of any track. I am confident that we will perform well in the coming races. I will be surprised if we finish on pole in Spain, but in the coming period we can be as fast as everyone else.”