2022 will be a year that Mercedes would like to quickly forget, seeing their eight year winning run of the constructors’ championship come to an abrupt end, with a third-place finish last season.
The new regulations that came into effect at the start of the year proved to be a major stumbling block for the Silver Arrows, who struggled to overcome a porpoising issue which cost them half a seasons’ worth of development.
Team principal Toto Wolff has explained that his team simply got the physics wrong surrounding the new rules and hopes that 2022 will be a one-off failure.
Seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton finished the season without a win for the first time in his career, while his new teammate George Russell managed to stand on the top step of the podium in Brazil towards the latter end of the year.
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Despite the team’s shortcomings at the start of Formula 1’s new era, Sky Sports pundit Karun Chandhok has made a bold claim about Mercedes’ latest driver pairing.
“It’s the best driver line-up on the grid. They are the best pairing on the grid,” claimed Chandhok, preferring the Mercedes drivers to Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez at Red Bull.
“Next year I expect a lot from Lewis Hamilton. He ended the season without a pole position or a victory. That will have done something to him, I think.
“And then things will start to get interesting – Mercedes has been able to improve. We saw that in Brazil. In the opening phase of the race, Lewis rightly had to give back that spot, and he struggled a bit on the mediums.”
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Chandhok has tipped sparks to fly once again next season, as Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen will be potentially battling each other for the championship once again after their rivalry boiled over in 2021.
George Russell has shown on numerous occasions last season that he is capable of beating his teammate in both qualifying and races, leading some fans to believe that the tide has turned for Hamilton at Mercedes earlier than he would have expected.
The 37-year-old will be itching to secure his record breaking eighth world title before handing the reins over to Russell, who has been tipped by many as a future world champion at only 24 years of age.