F1 News
Wolff and Mercedes confident in W14: 'It's full of surprises'
- GPblog.com
Mercedes hopes 2023 will bring more fotune than last year. The German formation wants to compete for the world title in the new race year, but to do so it will have to come up with a better car. Toto Wolff expects the team to succeed in this, as he told Planetf1.com.
After Mercedes discovered last season that the car was suffering a lot from porpoising, the workers behind the scenes started looking for solutions. Although the search cost a lot of championship points, it provided Mercedes with a lot of knowledge about the concept of the new car.
The team wants to use that knowledge next season to appear stronger on the grid. "It’s about the airflow, it’s about the weight distribution, it’s about the aero map," Wolff explained. "Our car fundamentally changed mid-year."
In doing so, Wolff sees a clear development within the Mercedes team. "I think we’ve come to the point that we understand pretty well why the car is not performing," he added. At the same time, it gives him hope that Mercedes was competitive again in the closing stages of the 2022 season.
Wolff on Mercedes' W14
In the same interview, Wolff discussed the new car that carries the name W14. The Austrian team boss is convinced that Red Bull Racing and Ferrari will be surprised by the qualities of the car. Indeed, he himself is quite impressed. "It’s full of surprises."