Paddock theory emerges - “Mercedes missed a trick…”

There is an air of caution around Mercedes’ hopes as the F1 Bahrain Grand Prix, the first race of 2023, looms.

Lewis Hamilton has already been written off from winning an elusive eighth championship by some experts, but his team's decision-making before the new engine regulations has now been questioned.

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Now Kravitz said on Sky: “Given the sport’s engine freeze until 2026, there is a theory around the paddock - because Mercedes were reliable with their power unit last year, they missed a trick in terms of designing it to be powerful but not reliable and then being able to fix the reliability, which was allowed up until September last year.

“Lots of other manufacturers did that. Renault did that, Ferrari did that, Honda did that. It meant that they couldn’t get to the end of the season without using an extra power unit and getting a penalty. 

“But they didn’t mind that because they could bring the changes to the engine on reliability but have a secondary benefit of adding a bit more power as well.

“Everyone can see that memo when an engine manufacturer says we want to bring [an upgrade] for reliability, that gets circulated to all the other manufacturers.

“Everybody knows what everybody else is doing but it doesn’t mean the engine manufacturers can’t add a little bit more power in the name of reliability as well.

“You ask Mercedes, they say: ‘We built the engine to do the whole season and in the case of the customers, both Aston-Martins and both Williams didn’t take an engine penalty last year with three power unit elements’.

“Well, you might say: ‘Hang on, you have gone the other way, you should have gone a bit more performance’.

“Take the hit on the engine penalty with reliability but be able to improve that under the engine freeze. But that is not what Mercedes have done and only time will tell if Mercedes live to regret that.”

Lewis Hamilton’s F1 title hopes ruled out

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Kravitz said: "Michael Schumacher wasn't able to win an eighth, Lewis Hamilton hasn't been able to win an eighth - is there something in the stars about an eighth world championship?"

Sky colleague Martin Brundle said: "I think time is looking against him."

Karun Chandhok added: "I think there's a very low chance of him winning that eighth title this year.

"Because unless Mercedes have got a huge amount of sandbags in that car it so far looks like they're not going to be able to stop Max this year."