Mercedes lost the lead in both F1 World Championships on Sunday when Lewis Hamilton brought home his only points in seventh place. Team mate Valtteri Bottas retired due to a wheel nut failure.
The result meant that Hamilton dropped to second place in the drivers ‘standings behind race winner Max Verstappen, whose victory also helped bring Red Bull to the top of the constructors’ table.
Mercedes struggled to keep up with Red Bull and Ferrari for much of the weekend in Monaco but later accepted that it was a track that was usually a problem.
The team has won only once in Monaco in the past five years and took the win in 2019 courtesy of Hamilton.
“I think if you are a proper anorak and look at our team’s performance at this track over the past few seasons, you will find that in years we have won championships with ease, we still have problems,” said Allison. Technical Director of Mercedes.
“Although we have generally been on a trail that has delivered a car that is a wide sword weapon that can attack most routes, this was an Achilles’ heel.
“Ironic [for] A car whose best weapon was using its tires on racetrack for racetrack, on that particular track that we always struggled a little with.
“We usually run out of ideas with a tire that died a little earlier than our competitors and we understand what we haven’t done in a few years.
“We have to use the first principles to find out what we’re doing wrong on this track and what we do year after year, that’s just not right here.”
Hamilton felt that the longer wheelbase design that Mercedes traditionally pursued with its cars stayed on its heel for Monaco every year.
“This has never been a strong track for us in general,” said Hamilton.
“We have the longest car, the longer the car means it’s like a bus to go around corners. So it’s not as nimble as the others on a small track like this one, but it’s great elsewhere.”
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Mercedes F1 boss Toto Wolff spoke about the importance of designing a car that would work well for the entire season and accepted that there would be certain layouts that would reveal weaknesses.
“We had outliers like 2019 I believe in terms of pace, but it’s similar to the kind of events we’ve had in Singapore in the past,” Wolff said.
“It’s kind of anchored in DNA whether our car drives well or not, and the answers are not always easy to find. It seems like an inherent DNA in the car.
“But in our case we know where to optimize the car, how to get the tires into a better window. And you build a car for 23 races and there will be outliers both ways where you will underperform.
“Monaco is definitely an outlier where you need a completely different car than, for example, the average routes.”
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