Other Teams Can Be Jealous Of Mercedes's Driver Lineup Allison Suggests

Tuesday, 12 December 2023 at 13:00

Technical director of Mercedes, James Allison, reflected on the 2023 season and suggested Mercedes's driver lineup is something other teams can "look at with an envious eye."

The Mercedes F1 team finished 2023 second in the Constructors Championship, 451 points behind Red Bull Racing in the first place and only three points ahead of Scuderia Ferrari in the third place.

Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz concluded after the end of the season his team had a faster car overall but was less consistent than Mercedes and did not make the most of its opportunities.

James Allison looked back at the season and said P2 was the absolute best Mercedes could have achieved in 2023. According to gpblog.com, he said:

"P2 was the absolute upper bound of what the team could achieve. We did a good job to get there. That does actually feel surprisingly good, albeit slightly in conflict with our desire to be unequivocally the best team."

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While the 451 points to Red Bull indicate an enormous gap in pace to Red Bull, which Mercedes wants to close until the 2024 season, Allison seems to be confident in his team:

"The team itself full of very strong engineers, an operation that would be the envy of many, notwithstanding a few mistakes that we made here and there during the year, and a driver lineup that I think all teams would look at with an envious eye."

The technical director praised Lewis Hamilton, who won six Drivers' and eight Constructors' Championships with the team as he said:

"We've got in one of our drivers, arguably the most successful person who's ever sat behind the wheel of a racing car."

Not all teams in F1 can be completely satisfied with their driver lineup, as many of them have pretty significant gaps between their drivers.

Mercedes has one top-tier, experienced driver who they already know can win the Championship and one young, upcoming, talented driver who will be the team's future in a few years, as indicated by the team principal. Allison added:

"And in the other one, a very, very promising younger man in George Russell. We're a very fortunate team. We need to make that good fortune count next year and hopefully take it one better than P2."