Lewis Hamilton hopes boosted as Russell offers positive W14 verdict

Lewis Hamilton’s hopes of finally winning a record-breaking eighth Drivers’ Championship title were given an early boost on Wednesday as Mercedes team-mate George Russell spoke highly of a ‘smooth’ day of running with the all-new W14 challenger at Silverstone. The Silver Arrows revealed their car for the upcoming season to the world in the morning before taking to the track at the home of British motorsport for a shakedown session in the afternoon.

Mercedes only completed around 15 kilometres of running at Silverstone but it seems as though it was enough for Russell to offer an encouraging verdict on the W14, which is decked out in a sleek all-black livery in a departure from the team’s traditional silver colours. He insisted that everything went smoothly but warned that it was tricky to draw firm conclusions from the very first day of on-track running, which took place just a matter of hours after the car was officially launched to the public.

“It’s been a smooth day, but it’s so difficult to say,” Russell told f1i. “Last year we came away from that shakedown not with too many thoughts to be honest, we were so compromised by weather.

“But you’ve got to take the results from today [with] a pinch of salt and make sure there’s no major scares and just make sure the car’s running today in Bahrain. That’s going to be the true test. As much as we want to get out of a day like today it’s kind of meaningless in that regard.”

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Mercedes have stuck with the revolutionary ‘sidepodless’ design philosophy they introduced last season, although a few minor tweaks have been made to the shape of the W14 in an attempt to reduce the bouncing on straights that plagued their efforts in 2022. The biggest changes have been made underneath the skin of the car, though, as explained by Mercedes technical director Mike Elliott at Wednesday’s launch event.

“We have completely changed front and rear suspension to help with the weight of the car and the handling,” said Elliott. “Still, we have not completely abandoned the concept of the W13, which gave the entire team grey hairs in 2022.

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“There’s significant changes in the bodywork, the core DNA is the same. We have looked at every area and said: how can we improve? We looked at the problems from last year and asked how we can guarantee as best we can that we don’t have those problems.

“It’s all in the details. After eight years of winning back-to-back world championships and then having a poor year, many might expect that we would be tearing up the drawings and starting again, but that’s not the case.”

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