What’s going wrong with Mercedes?
After the Canadian Grand Prix, Michael Schumacher is left with no hopes for the title win of this season. The Mercedes driver is disappointed with the way things have turned out for him and for the team this year. It is high time now that Mercedes start digging deep, to find out what actually went wrong for them and if there are still any chances of turning the tables.
Given the current points standing, hopes for Mercedes are very dim. Ross Brawn's team now stands at fourth place with their one hundred and eight points, while the McLaren rules at the top of the charts with their two hundred and fifteen points. At the present moment, with eight races already gone and another eleven to come, Schumacher stands at the ninth place while Lewis Hamilton tops the Driver’s Championship with seventy five points more than Schumacher. The Mercedes motorsport chief, Norbert Haug, has already congratulated their engine partners, McLaren for their victory at the Canadian Grand Prix at the post race press conference.
At Montreal, Schumacher admitted that he takes 2010 as more of a year of building up and organising things for the next season. Adding, that he had tried to follow up his title battle but one never knows how a long year will pan out.
Well, it was only the last year when Brawn admitted that the team that wins the title has to be behind their rivals right from the start. But McLaren proved last year how quickly a team can completely turn things around.
The Mercedes had a big advantage during the early-season races. If they had availed advantages early-on they would not have needed to push hard at the end of the season. However, their rivals moved with full momentum finding their ways of getting more out of their cars at a time when Brawn were slowly declining.
The changes made in the team at the end of last season were thought to be positive, as losing Jenson Button to McLaren made way for the seven-time champion. With Michael Schumacher in the team, the loss of Rubens Barrichello to Williams was taken in happily, as it was thought that pairing Nico Rosberg with Schumacher was an ideal situation.
However, one of the reasons for the Mercedes' downward graph could have been the removal of both the team drivers simultaneously at a time when all rival teams retained at least one driver from 2009. None of the current Mercedes drivers have driven the title-winning Brawn machine before and for Schumacher it is the first modern F1 machinery after coming back to race in 2010.
In addition, they admitted earlier this year, they had made a big mistake with their cars’ weight distribution. Introducing new wider front tyres on which they based the entire cars’ design.
Moreover, the team had been concentrating more on car development and far less on the race strategy. In Monaco, the two cars held each other up in the qualifying round and during the race Schumacher was advised to make the last-lap, overlooking the safety car regulations, which resulted in his penalty. Most recently, in Canada, they gave Schumacher the wrong tyres. It is strange to see the team giving such little time to race strategies.
Recent layoffs at Team Mercedes have reduced the headcount, which evidently has had a negative effect. With fewer people in their design room as compared to their rivals, a change in results seems difficult.
Besides all the ills and odds one still cannot forget what Mercedes has got with them. Michael Schumacher, and if he can continue his progress, he is still the same man who can create magic on the tracks.
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