Mercedes set 'very ambitious targets' for 2024 F1 car

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Andrew Shovlin, Mercedes’ trackside engineering director, outlines the scale of change planned for next year to try and eradicate the W14’s handling ills.

Mercedes’ in-development 2024 Formula 1 challenger will represent a “quite considerable” change to this year’s car, with the former champions “not clinging on to any concepts that we’ve had before” as they bid to return to title-challenging ways.

Speaking at the Japanese GP, trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin said it was clear this year’s W14 “doesn’t have enough stability” with insufficient downforce, meaning drivers Lewis Hamilton and George Russell do not have the confidence to fully attack high-speed corners.

“We are changing the car quite considerably for next year,” he said. “Whether or not we can solve all the issues that we’ve got with the handling, that will depend on the number of projects we deliver.”.

However, Shovlin says Mercedes has set themselves “very ambitious targets” to improve things in 2024.

“Those projects are underway. They are not complete, but we have some good directions to try and improve that.”

“When we launched our best cars in 2015 or 2019, we didn’t know they were going to be great cars when we developed them. You are just working as hard as you can, trying to find as much performance as you can.

“On a lot of those cars, we missed targets by quite a chunk in terms of performance, but what we do know is that if you don’t set very ambitious targets, you’re probably not setting them high enough.”

In conclusion, Lewis Hamilton says Mercedes needs the next six months to be the greatest in their development history in order to close the gap with Red Bull. READ MORE

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