Mercedes GP: MGP-W02 almost there, but not there – 2011 Formula 1 season review
The 2011 formula 1 season has kicked off in quite an exciting style with exclusion of the Red Bull team as every other team has enjoyed a competitive fight in the mid field, while Red Bull have enjoyed the podium finishes.
Mercedes GP are still far behind the racing peck, which includes Ferrari, McLaren and Renault.
Mercedes GP headed by Ross Brawn came into the 2011 season with poor reliability and drastic speed. The reliability issues have been somewhat resolved, but the speed is still a virtue that the Mercedes’ car, MGP-W02, does not have.
Starting with the pre-season testing sessions in Spain, the German team suffered from reliability problems. Mercedes team mostly did the tests on the car’s reliability issues and left behind the aerodynamic updates a little too late.
The German team struggled in the first three testing sessions in Valencia, Jerez and Barcelona. The team engineers took the aerodynamic updates easily and struggled to get the car more reliable.
In the last test in Barcelona, Mercedes team brought some aerodynamic changes to the car, which paid off because both of their drivers, Nico Rosberg and Michael Schumacher, felt comfortable in that and were the fastest for the last week of the testing.
Ross Brawn mentioned that bringing the updates so late in the season would hinder the development of the car, which actually happened during the course of three grands prix of the 2011 season.
In the Australian Grand Prix, the Mercedes team was well down and out of the race as both drivers failed to put a mark in it. Both, Schumi and Nico were not able to finish the race after being involved in separate crashes during the course of the race. Schumi
was disappointed about the performance and commented that the car is just not ready to be competitive.
In the Malaysian Grand Prix, the reliability of the Mercedes team was better than before as both cars saw the chequered flag. Schumi opened his and Mercedes’ team account by scoring two points in the race while Nico finished in 13th position.
Although the Mercedes team has the best Drag Reduction System on their car, yet the front running Red Bull and McLaren teams were unstoppable.
Moving onto the Chinese Grand Prix, Mercedes showed a completely changed performance. With good reliability, the car’s speed was also improved and for the first time, the team made its mark in the top tem positions.
Nico qualified in as high as fourth position, but Schumi was still in the 14th place. As the race started, the MGP-W02 of Nico surprised many critics and was neck to neck with the defending champion of Red Bull, Sebastian Vettel.
Nico remained in fourth place for about 11 laps and then pitted ahead of every other top running driver.
Nico then joined the race in first position and led the race for almost 25 laps only before his team radioed him and told that his car’s fuel level was critical. After that, Nico slowed down to finish the race in fifth place.
Mercedes have climbed up the constructors’ table to at least sit ahead of the lower ranked teams. A lot of upgrades will be seen in the Mercedes team and a lot more challenging grands prix will be seen in the 2011 Formula 1 season.
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