Mercedes "specialists in bouncing" - Wolff

Mercedes

Mercedes "specialists in bouncing" - Wolff

Porpoising issues continued in Miami

Ewan Gale

Thursday 12 May 2022 05:00

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff has conceded the Silver Arrows are "specialists in bouncing".

The team struggled with porpoising yet again at the Miami Grand Prix despite upgrades taken to the United States having seemingly cured the issues during Friday practice.

George Russell had finished the first day of running top of the timesheets but was only able to qualify 12th for the inaugural race at the Miami International Autodrome, leaving the team in a state of confusion.

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“It seemed on Friday that the low downforce set up worked and helped the porpoising," said Wolff.

"But the track gripped up, there was more wind on Saturday so it looks like it didn’t cure the porpoising.

“I think we are now specialists in bouncing and we can divide that in various categories whether that is porpoising or bouncing or bottoming, it is the full range.

"We will not slice that up but fundamentally it is always the same problem.”

Mercedes correlation issues explained

Over the Miami weekend, Wolff detailed how the team was struggling to correlate feedback from the drivers and data gained from the car on-track.

This means that it is nigh-impossible for the team to change the car to help Russell and Lewis Hamilton overcome the porpoising issues.

"As a matter of fact, the data sometimes doesn’t show what the drivers tell us," explained Wolff.

“Certainly, they have their hands full with a car that is just not at all comfortable to drive, nice to drive or predictable to drive but the data doesn’t show these big swings.