United States Grand Prix: ‘How did Mercedes make such a mistake?’

WHAT had been the best race of Mercedes’ difficult 2023 season was wrecked when Lewis Hamilton’s car was disqualified from the United States Grand Prix for a technical infringement.

And that result came despite Mercedes admitting that they had made a major strategic blunder without which they could even have won the race – and would certainly have forced Verstappen to pass Hamilton to win on a day when Red Bull did not have their usual performance advantage over the rest.

But the reason for Hamilton’s disqualification rendered moot any conclusions about his performance in a car that featured an upgrade which he said had made a significant difference to its behaviour.

Hamilton, along with Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, was thrown out of the results for excessive wear of the underfloor skid blocks in the car’s ‘plank’.

These are used to control ride-height, to prevent teams running their cars too low. And the reason governing body the FIA wants to do so is that usually running a car low makes it faster.

The upgrade on the Mercedes was a new floor, which Hamilton said had transformed its balance.

All year, Hamilton and team-mate George Russell been complaining about the car’s lack of rear grip, which they say has robbed them of the confidence they need to commit to corner entry.

This is where Hamilton said the car had improved.

“The step we were able to take this weekend has given me a little bit more confidence in the car to throw it into the corners,” the seven-time champion said.

“I really enjoyed driving around this track. There are still some of the fundamental issues we are having with the car which won’t change until next year. But it was really positive to feel the step we had taken.

“Maybe it was only 0.1secs upgrade (in terms of theoretical car performance) but there was at least a 0.1secs of confidence it gave me. It is quite interesting when you see what happens when you do have those; it’s like a double knock-on effect.”

An added benefit was that the upgrade had improved the car’s relative performance compared to its rivals in areas of the track where its weaknesses were most highlighted – high-speed corners.

In Japan, two races ago, the Mercedes was uncompetitive through Suzuka’s Esses compared to all other front-running cars.

But in the Esses at Austin this weekend, which are quite similar in nature to those at Suzuka in being a series of high-speed changes of direction, the Mercedes was competitive. As team principal Toto Wolff put it: “It was our best sector.”

What Mercedes will not know until next weekend’s Mexican Grand Prix at least is whether running the car low enough to contravene the rules on skid-block wear had an effect on these gains.

Insiders at the team admitted that the mistake they made would have made some difference to the car’s performance, but suspected it would not have led to any significant advantage. And they were confident that the upgrade had made a positive difference to the car.

That meant they left the track feeling relatively pleased about making a performance step forward, even if they were fed up that the car had been disqualified for what they believed was an oversight caused by the specific circumstances of the weekend.

But it is simply not possible to know that, and it will take the evidence of a few more races to conclude whether the floor update has had the effect they believe it has.- bbc.com