Since resuming his role as Technical Director at Mercedes, James Allison has quietly been working in the background. Every now and then, he comes up to answer questions on their Formula 1 plans. Recently, he talked about the new floor for Mercedes at the Austin GP. He said Mercedes hopes they can get on terms with McLaren because challenging Red Bull is a long way away.
“Neither of those things”
James Allison was asked whether these Mercedes upgrades are for immediate lap time or for 2024’s W15. His answer was quite astounding.
He said, “Neither of those things. It should be good at any circuit for the remainder of the year. It’s not transformative, [it] should be about a tenth of a second.”
The Mercedes TD continued, “It’s in the direction we think is decent, both for producing downforce in the right place, and hopefully being resistant to the bounciness that all these cars nibble at as soon as you try and get much downforce from them.”
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Level with McLaren
James Allison opined that Mercedes were just ahead of McLaren at the Formula 1 Qatar GP. He believes that both Mercedes would’ve finished in the top 5 interleaved with the two McLaren cars, behind Max Verstappen’s Red Bull.
The Mercedes man said, “I think we were pretty much on their pace, not quicker than them, not slower than them, but ahead of them in Qatar.”
He continued, “Hopefully the floor that we are going to pop on the car at the next race in Austin could bring us up on level terms in any of the races to come.”
“Pretty Confident”
Mercedes is still a long way off of challenging Red Bull in Formula 1. They will need a big improvement to challenge them next season. James Allison is aware of that. He is confident in the direction Mercedes are taking with their car.
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He said, “We are pretty hopeful that we have got a good handle on what has been ailing us. Therefore, we are pretty confident that we know which direction to head in for the following season, for next season.”
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