The doubts surrounding Mercedes in 2023 and ‘Plan B’ to salvage F1 season

Mercedes unveiled a similar design for 2023 to the car that battled significant issues last year

Ted Kravitz believes that Mercedes could be developing a back-up plan due to doubts about how their new car will perform.

The team unveiled their new W14 last week, a vehicle with many design similarities to the W13 car utilised last year.

Mercedes dealt with significant problems in 2022, struggling to get a porpoising problem under control, and ultimately failing to consistently challenge for race or overall victory.

While Toto Wolff will be hopeful that Lewis Hamilton and George Russell enjoy rather smoother seasons this year, Sky Sports reporter Kravitz feels that the Austrian and his staff would be wise to explore alternative designs.

While Mercedes have stuck with the novel zero pod idea, Kravitz thinks that the German team are already working on a “Plan B” that more closely mirrors the approach of Red Bull and Ferrari.

“They’re giving their big idea, that was a failure last year, one more go,” Kravitz told Sky Sports.

“But I believe they have a ‘Plan B’ in production, and if they need to, they can go to a ‘Plan B’, which is the Red Bull or Ferrari style of doing things, in the middle of the season.

“At the moment they’re saying, ‘look, we think we’ve got a proper handle on what went wrong last year. We still believe that our way is unique in the pit lane and having very slim sideboards is the way to go aerodynamically’.

“And anyway, they say most of the downforce is generated by the floor, which you can’t see, but they’re saying don’t expect anything too soon.

“I think if they went away without three or four wins in a season, they’d be disappointed.”

Testing in Bahrain this weekend will serve as a crucial opportunity for Mercedes and the rest of the grid to get on track ahead of the season-opening race at the Sakhir Circuit on Sunday 5 March.

Red Bull’s Constructors Championship win in 2022 brought to an end an eight-year run of Mercedes dominance, with the German outfit only able to finish third.

Both Hamilton and Russell will hope to better sixth and fourth place finishes respectively in the Drivers’ Championship as they attempt to deny Max Verstappen a third successive world title.