F1 News
Are Mercedes sandbagging? Antonelli's words give rivals reason to fear
Not only will F1 go back to Melbourne to hold the first race of the season as it had been customary for nearly thirty years, but apparently, Mercedes' old 'sandbagging' approach has made a comeback. When asked about the performance of the German team's 2025 contender, Andrea Kimi Antonelli, George Russell and team principal and CEO, Toto Wolff, all gave telling answers.
As far as 2024 is concerned, it doesn't really serve Antonelli as a good benchmark since he will make his debut in F1 this year. "I don't really know because last year I didn't have a lot of experience with W15, so I can't really say much the difference between two cars," said the Italian to media including GPblog in the paddock in Australia.
However, having completed many TPC (Testing of previous cars) programs, the Italian knows what good race car is supposed to feel like and the W16 has met the Italian's standards in Bahrain. "The car felt very drivable, easy to push and it was giving good confidence. So I think that was a really important thing." Indeed, something that has hindered Mercedes' progress in the past three years was the inability to build cars whose behavior gave its drivers the confidence to push.
Are Mercedes sanbagging after all?
Although not everything is perfect, the Italian looks to have more clarity in the first relevant session in Australia. "Obviously, there's a few things we need to work on, but we know where we should work on. But overall, the car felt pretty good in testing, but it's really hard to say because you never know what the others are doing. So I guess we'll see in qualifying in Melbourne," Kimi Antonelli concluded.
Back when Mercedes was dominating the F1 championship, an old racing term became coined, "sandbagging." During testing the German team would appear to be slower than it really was on track. Only to 'surprise' friend and foe alike when the time came to turn the engines up during Q3. Are Mercedes sandbagging once again? We shall see when the first qualifying session of the year gets underway in Australia, which you'll be able to experience with our liveblog.