2026 Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 Team

[Tonino]

Toto of old would have laughed in their faces if they’d suggested he model this “fashion,” but Toto of the new is all about the mooooney and fame, so of course he said yes.

I wonder if he shows up at VLN this weekend. If he is a racer....this might be the only interesting races for AMG this year. And he can celebrate with a good driver

He won't. His son is karting this weekend, WSK Super Master Series at Franciacorta.

[zibby43]

Agree - they’re not apples to apples comparisons. The PUs had been converging for 8-9 years at that point. How these PUs operate in this era touches every engineering choice elsewhere in the car - which is why constructors have shown such a sizable advantage over customer teams.

Optimization is not the work of a moment and 1) we don’t know how much Merc has in hand and 2) it seems like most development arguments assume Merc can’t continue to unlock/optimize their package further.

In the (old)V6 era although Mercedes came out of the gate way ahead of everyone, they still had plenty of room to develop, even Ferrari that isn't so bad needs to find something that will give them a serious bump in HP.
They need to understand why Mercedes is so much stronger and reverse engineer it(has the speculation started? I mean besides the compression thing).

When it comes to aero teams largely converged into one concept midway through the second season and Red Bull hit a wall in the 3rd.

Yep. What fascinates me, and I'm sure we'll learn more in time, is how Merc have designed the chassis and aero to work with the PU in order to derive their lap time.

[MattLightBlue]

Agree - they’re not apples to apples comparisons. The PUs had been converging for 8-9 years at that point. How these PUs operate in this era touches every engineering choice elsewhere in the car - which is why constructors have shown such a sizable advantage over customer teams.

Optimization is not the work of a moment and 1) we don’t know how much Merc has in hand and 2) it seems like most development arguments assume Merc can’t continue to unlock/optimize their package further.

In the (old)V6 era although Mercedes came out of the gate way ahead of everyone, they still had plenty of room to develop, even Ferrari that isn't so bad needs to find something that will give them a serious bump in HP.
They need to understand why Mercedes is so much stronger and reverse engineer it(has the speculation started? I mean besides the compression thing).

When it comes to aero teams largely converged into one concept midway through the second season and Red Bull hit a wall in the 3rd.

Yep. What fascinates me, and I'm sure we'll learn more in time, is how Merc have designed the chassis and aero to work with the PU in order to derive their lap time.

Can I just say that this chassis for engine is journalists BS and it is what every team does? The fact that Mercedes has lower apex speed and less tyre deg is a consequence that they are not bringing the car to the limit, because they gain almost a second on the straights and acceleration mini sectors.
We will see the real value of the chassis when some team will get comparable PU performance.

[Lasssept]

[zibby43]

In the (old)V6 era although Mercedes came out of the gate way ahead of everyone, they still had plenty of room to develop, even Ferrari that isn't so bad needs to find something that will give them a serious bump in HP.
They need to understand why Mercedes is so much stronger and reverse engineer it(has the speculation started? I mean besides the compression thing).

When it comes to aero teams largely converged into one concept midway through the second season and Red Bull hit a wall in the 3rd.

Yep. What fascinates me, and I'm sure we'll learn more in time, is how Merc have designed the chassis and aero to work with the PU in order to derive their lap time.

Can I just say that this chassis for engine is journalists BS and it is what every team does? The fact that Mercedes has lower apex speed and less tyre deg is a consequence that they are not bringing the car to the limit, because they gain almost a second on the straights and acceleration mini sectors.
We will see the real value of the chassis when some team will get comparable PU performance.

Sure, you can say it. Don't agree with it. All the manufacturers of course endeavor to make the chassis, PU, and aero as one, integrated/coheisve unit. My argument is that Mercedes have simply done a better job. Some of that is due to probably starting earlier. Some of that is because they've designed the PU and have had access to all of the important data earlier than a customer team. Take Mercedes and McLaren, which are both running this class-leading power unit.

Why aren't McLaren out in front with them if it's simply down to PU performance alone? As you suggest?

There are massive differences now, compared to the previous spec of engines and cars, in terms of torque loadings going through the chassis and gearbox. This requires all these components to be designed in a way to handle those loadings. The suspension has to be able to cope, as well, in order to manage the tires (and Mercedes looks to have excellent degradation and suffered little to no graining in China, especially relative to something like the RB which grained quite badly). How does the gearbox handle power delivery with these new PUs?

And then the harvesting demands of these PUs will have raised new challenges with brake design and calibration. There is much less emphasis on mechanical braking now. More braking is being handled by the rear axle. All of these changes have an enormous impact on how a car behaves entering a corner. And then the specifics/dynamics regarding how the car enters various types of corners will change the aero balance of the car, and so on.

So yeah, to pretend none of those factors matter, and that optimizing the car around how you run the PU is irrelevant, makes just about 0 sense to me.

[venkyhere]

Yep. What fascinates me, and I'm sure we'll learn more in time, is how Merc have designed the chassis and aero to work with the PU in order to derive their lap time.

Can I just say that this chassis for engine is journalists BS and it is what every team does? The fact that Mercedes has lower apex speed and less tyre deg is a consequence that they are not bringing the car to the limit, because they gain almost a second on the straights and acceleration mini sectors.
We will see the real value of the chassis when some team will get comparable PU performance.

Sure, you can say it. Don't agree with it. All the manufacturers of course endeavor to make the chassis, PU, and aero as one, integrated/coheisve unit. My argument is that Mercedes have simply done a better job. Some of that is due to probably starting earlier. Some of that is because they've designed the PU and have had access to all of the important data earlier than a customer team. Take Mercedes and McLaren, which are both running this class-leading power unit.

Why aren't McLaren out in front with them if it's simply down to PU performance alone? As you suggest?

There are massive differences now, compared to the previous spec of engines and cars, in terms of torque loadings going through the chassis and gearbox. This requires all these components to be designed in a way to handle those loadings. The suspension has to be able to cope, as well, in order to manage the tires (and Mercedes looks to have excellent degradation and suffered little to no graining in China, especially relative to something like the RB which grained quite badly). How does the gearbox handle power delivery with these new PUs?

And then the harvesting demands of these PUs will have raised new challenges with brake design and calibration. There is much less emphasis on mechanical braking now. More braking is being handled by the rear axle. All of these changes have an enormous impact on how a car behaves entering a corner. And then the specifics/dynamics regarding how the car enters various types of corners will change the aero balance of the car, and so on.

So yeah, to pretend none of those factors matter, and that optimizing the car around how you run the PU is irrelevant, makes just about 0 sense to me.

Rather than dancing around the 'better optimization' theory,
How about a much simpler theory : Mercedes' ICE produces more torque/power than other teams (including customers), so more energy to deploy, more opportunity to recover. Ultimately, energy comes from fuel, even for a quali lap (forget race lap).
I think that answers the 1s/lap advantage more convincingly.

[zibby43]

Can I just say that this chassis for engine is journalists BS and it is what every team does? The fact that Mercedes has lower apex speed and less tyre deg is a consequence that they are not bringing the car to the limit, because they gain almost a second on the straights and acceleration mini sectors.
We will see the real value of the chassis when some team will get comparable PU performance.

Sure, you can say it. Don't agree with it. All the manufacturers of course endeavor to make the chassis, PU, and aero as one, integrated/coheisve unit. My argument is that Mercedes have simply done a better job. Some of that is due to probably starting earlier. Some of that is because they've designed the PU and have had access to all of the important data earlier than a customer team. Take Mercedes and McLaren, which are both running this class-leading power unit.

Why aren't McLaren out in front with them if it's simply down to PU performance alone? As you suggest?

There are massive differences now, compared to the previous spec of engines and cars, in terms of torque loadings going through the chassis and gearbox. This requires all these components to be designed in a way to handle those loadings. The suspension has to be able to cope, as well, in order to manage the tires (and Mercedes looks to have excellent degradation and suffered little to no graining in China, especially relative to something like the RB which grained quite badly). How does the gearbox handle power delivery with these new PUs?

And then the harvesting demands of these PUs will have raised new challenges with brake design and calibration. There is much less emphasis on mechanical braking now. More braking is being handled by the rear axle. All of these changes have an enormous impact on how a car behaves entering a corner. And then the specifics/dynamics regarding how the car enters various types of corners will change the aero balance of the car, and so on.

So yeah, to pretend none of those factors matter, and that optimizing the car around how you run the PU is irrelevant, makes just about 0 sense to me.

Rather than dancing around the 'better optimization' theory,
How about a much simpler theory : Mercedes' ICE produces more torque/power than other teams (including customers), so more energy to deploy, more opportunity to recover. Ultimately, energy comes from fuel, even for a quali lap (forget race lap).
I think that answers the 1s/lap advantage more convincingly.

How does the works team ICE produce more torque/power than the customer teams' units?

[Lasssept]

[F1NAC]

From sprintQ highlights there is a shot of antonelli approaching the hairpin with timing ticking. And with pausing you can clearly see that front wing closes in over 400 ms…

[zibby43]

Another nothing burger served up by the Italian media.

[WardenOfTheNorth]

From sprintQ highlights there is a shot of antonelli approaching the hairpin with timing ticking. And with pausing you can clearly see that front wing closes in over 400 ms…

That's some impressive pausing.....

[F1NAC]

From sprintQ highlights there is a shot of antonelli approaching the hairpin with timing ticking. And with pausing you can clearly see that front wing closes in over 400 ms…

That's some impressive pausing.....

There is nothing impressive really.. the sector time is shown live. Once you see rear wing closing (because front wing starts also at the same time) and pause when front wing is fully closed it is more than 0.4 sec

[OverheatedTurbo]

This twitter account is a secret Mercedes Op/hater. I have no evidence but also no doubts.

[zibby43]

Mercedes with a slightly tweaked livery this weekend.

https://x.com/mercedesamgf1/status/2036 ... w2eCbwUjFA

[Lasssept]