George Russell has been purring in a balanced car in pre-season while Aston Martin are still hunting for power
The big four – Mercedes, Red Bull, Ferrari and McLaren – have been at pains throughout testing to claim they are not the top dog, in something of an inverse Mexican standoff, each decrying their own strengths. Undeniably, however, Mercedes emerge from the three pre-season tests looking strong.
Mercedes’ car and engine were reliable, completing the most laps of any team. Perhaps most importantly the car looks balanced and easy to handle, planted through the corners, in stark contrast to their travails of recent years. It is performing just as the simulation data predicted, so George Russell has been purring.
The pecking order among the top four is still somewhat opaque and will remain so until qualifying in Melbourne, but if Mercedes have been sandbagging – and they have yet to run on low fuel and soft tyres – then their real pace is going to be formidable.
With such a wide-ranging regulation change, nothing is quite cut and dried. Red Bull have shown efficient energy recovery architecture, enabling them to deploy more electrical power for longer to deliver a straight-line speed advantage.
