F1 News
Disaster for Mercedes: But team are "happy to have learn more about its behaviour"
Mercedes had a difficult day in Barcelona after Lewis Hamilton stopped on track during Formula 1 winter testing. Despite this, James Allison reports that the team gained some important data from Hamilton's 14 laps in the afternoon session.
Stopping out on track
It's rare to see a Mercedes stop out on the track. The six-time world champions reported that an oil pressure issue ended their day early. But that's not the first time such an issue has plagued a Mercedes engine this pre-season.
Walked past the Merc garage in the pitlane and the blinds are up - that means the engine cover is off, and thát means it's a PU issue.
— Nicolás Quarles van Ufford (@Nico_QvU) February 27, 2020
If you count Williams' engine troubles, that's 4x now a Mercedes engine has failed. Will try to follow up later#F1 #F1Testing https://t.co/rnob4aOfGR
"It's frustrating when there are only six days of winter testing, to be spending half of one day in the garage. But, nevertheless, we did some good work this morning with Valtteri. Furthermore, in the solitary run that we managed with Lewis this afternoon, we managed to get a very useful data point from the car," Allison reported.
Meanwhile, Hamilton confirmed that everything was "feeling fine during his 14 laps on the track.
"I only got 14 laps in today, but during those 14 laps, everything was feeling fine. It's obviously not ideal that we didn't get a full day of running in and we experienced this issue, but there are lots of learnings to take from today. Rather than looking at the negatives, we've discovered some things we need to work on, and we'll keep pushing hard to resolve them and keep working away," Hamilton said.