Mercedes Technical Director James Allison has denied that the team’s ‘zeropod’ concept was the “decisive factor” in its struggles over the previous two Formula 1 seasons.
The German marque entered the sport’s latest regulation cycle in 2022 off the back of an unprecedented record run of eight consecutive Constructors’ Championships.
However, Mercedes has been unable to replicate its former glories in this era and has only amassed a solitary race win since F1’s return to ground effect machinery last year.
Mercedes caught the eye when it unveiled an ambitious interpretation of the current rules set at the second pre-season test of 2022 with a car featuring slimmed-down sidepods.
Despite encountering severe problems with the porpoising phenomenon, a breakthrough 1-2 result at the penultimate round in Brazil prompted Mercedes to retain the concept.
But the Brackley-based squad would decide to abandon the solution after the first qualifying session of 2023, introducing more conventional bodywork at the Monaco Grand Prix that converted it to the downwash sidepod philosophy pioneered by Red Bull.
While an improvement landed Mercedes second in the standings, the team remained restricted by the chassis of its launch-spec car and ended an F1 campaign without a single victory for the first time since 2011.
Allison believes it would be too simplistic to attribute Mercedes’ troubles to the zero-sidepod development route and argues the idea wasn’t the one that “sealed our destiny”.
“I don’t see the world as you see it, who look at the side and decide it’s a concept with our car we certainly took a path that, from the tip of the nose to the tail, was not competitive,” Allison said on Sky F1’s season review video.
“What caught the eye obviously were the sides, but it was certainly not a decisive factor.
“The concept was wrong from start to finish and the bellies are perhaps the emblem of a team that took too long to understand which side they were on, but they are absolutely not the element that sealed our destiny.”
Mercedes has revealed that it will launch a new concept for its W15 challenger as it bids to close down the sizeable deficit to Red Bull, who won every race bar one last season.
The ex-Ferrari engineer has said the former eight-time champions are lining up a bid for the 2024 F1 titles by adopting a “pretty ambitious program” with next year’s car.
“I hope that we have put in place enough of a programme of work that we have put ourselves in with a shout to be back to winning ways,” Allison expanded recently.
“Does that mean winning a race? Does that mean winning a championship? In my head, it’s only ever about championships. That’s what F1 is. It’s a Constructors and a Drivers’ Championship.
“So I hope we will have done enough to give ourselves a shout of being in the championship fight in both championships.”
