Did Mercedes really stumble at Bahrain despite a fresh floor and bodywork? The team had to decide its next move after the underwhelming result in Malaysia.
The Anglo‑German outfit chose split specifications for Singapore, sending George Russell back to the older chassis that had won him Baku. The Brit welcomed the switch, hoping to isolate any hidden issues with the new updates, especially with a power‑unit penalty already hampering him.
“Cost cap forced us into a rapid back‑to‑back test in Singapore,” deputy team principal Bradley Lord said on the Nu Silver Arrows Radio Show. “It gave us the quickest real‑world learning, even if sprint conditions weren’t ideal, by rolling back George’s spec and running old and new side by side after spotting unexpected behaviour in Sepang.”
“It’s always a constraint, but every team lives with it. We must squeeze the most performance out of what we have,” he added.
George Russell, Mercedes
Deputy technical director Simone Resta admitted Mercedes was caught off‑guard by Sepang’s unique character, calling it a very different circuit.
“The tarmac is tough, conditions swing fast. It can scorch one moment and rain the next, with scorching ambient temps and brutal tyre wear,” the Italian explained.
“Compared to an average track, Sepang sits off the scale. We weren’t sure our data would translate one‑to‑one elsewhere. Still, we left confident we were competitive, even if the step forward we expected didn’t materialise under those conditions.”
“We had a doubt, and the fastest answer is a test. Rather than linger, we decided to run a trial at the next race to gauge the package, and it delivered what we hoped.”
“George volunteered for the test, which was fantastic. He’s a true team player and always thinks about the squad’s best interests.”
George Russell, Mercedes
Resta noted the upgrade did raise downforce as intended, but the gain wasn’t uniform, upsetting the car’s balance and creating a stronger front end than anticipated. In my view, the split‑spec gamble was bold.
“We need to recentre the operating window, and that takes time, especially on a sprint weekend where you have limited laps before the sprint and then rain in the race.
“From a clock perspective it’s a long weekend, but lap‑wise it’s short, so we must accelerate our learning as much as possible.”
Mercedes introduced a new front wing in Singapore, which Antonelli tried only in the sole free‑practice session before reverting to the older version.
“To speed up learning, we even tested the new front wing in P1,” Resta said. “In a short span we altered many parts, aiming to gather data quickly for the short‑ and medium‑term, even though we didn’t plan to race it.
“That data becomes an investment for the future: we analyse it, simulate, and then apply the insights later.”
Andrea Kimi Antonelli, Mercedes
Lord added, “Running that wing in FP1 paid off; the insights should help us hit the ground running in Austin with both cars updated and the new wing, aiming for higher peak performance than we’ve achieved so far.”
Did Mercedes ever consider fitting the new wing for the whole weekend?
“We only had a single example,” Lord explained. “We rushed it through production, but with just one you risk damage in the pits. The risk outweighed the benefit for qualifying or the sprint, though the learning was invaluable.
Russell clawed his way up to ninth from the back of the Marina Bay grid, while Antonelli secured a podium, edging closer to his first F1 win.
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– The Team