Mercedes forced to halt F1 upgrades as crash damage costs bite

Mercedes has been forced to stop development of its current Formula 1 car after a recent spate of crashes.

The German manufacturer has endured some costly accidents since the summer – including Andrea Kimi Antonelli’s practice crash in Monza, plus George Russell’s offs in Austin qualifying and Mexico practice.

With the repair bill adding up, especially with Russell damaging a chassis last weekend, Mercedes says that cost cap restrictions mean there is no money left to bring any more upgrades.

Speaking about the situation, Wolff said: “In the cost cap landscape, it is a tricky situation.

“These three shunts put us on the back foot, and certainly the one that happened [on Friday in Mexico] was massive. We had to opt for a completely new chassis and that is a tremendous hit in the cost cap.

“We probably have to dial down on what we put on the car. So we’ll be having two upgrade packages in Brazil, two floors, but that’s basically it. There’s nothing else that’s going to come.

“We have certain limitation on parts where we need to be creative how we’re managing them.

Andrea Kimi Antonelli, Mercedes F1 W15, walks away from his damaged car after a crash in FP1

Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

“And certainly there is an impact on how many development parts we can put on the car: because the answer is zero.”

Despite the cost cap fears, and the potential for a bigger headache if there are any more crashes, Wolff said no consideration was given to stopping Lewis Hamilton and Russell fighting hard for position in Mexico.

“They are so good and so experienced that we allow the racing,” he explained. “There was not a feeling where I thought it’s getting a bit hairy.

“I think we made the call to George at the end, where it was clear that Lewis was the faster car to maybe [tell him] that one defence on the straight was a bit of a late move. But I don’t have any doubts in the two.”

Split packages

While Mercedes will have two new floors available in Brazil, with Russell’s repaired Austin version now ready, Wolff thinks the team may still split packages across its cars.

Asked what the plan was, Wolff said: “I’m always open-minded about what the drivers think.

“If I’m certain that George is going to go for the new, Lewis may want to back to back the old floor now in Brazil. We will certainly talk with him and see what his preference is.”

Toto Wolff, Team Principal and CEO, Mercedes-AMG F1 Team

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

Hamilton potentially going back to the old version comes with Mercedes still having doubts about whether or not the new package has introduced some aero imbalance that is triggering incidents.

Wolff added: “There may be something in the aero update package that causes something that we don’t understand because we had two massive crashes in the same corner in Austin. But then we had a crash on the old car too.

“These cars are so on the knife edge that it will be an interesting experiment in Brazil, to see whether there is a high speed instability or a low speed factor. I don’t think we can just extrapolate that one is better than the other.”