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First stop of the Ricard-Red Bull Ring-Silverstone triple header, the French Grand Prix saw the Silver Arrows dominate their opponents, thanks, among other things, to the installation of the “Phase 2.1” version of Mercedes' V6 engine. Ferrari, Red Bull and Sauber also modified key parts of their chassis at Paul Ricard.
HORSES UNLEASHED IN THE CAMARGUE
Scheduled for Canada then delayed sine die, the second specification of the Mercedes engine was finally installed for the French Grand Prix on all six cars powered by the V6 hybrid designed in Brixworth.
The power gain of this version, dubbed "Phase 2.1", combined with the low mileage of the block, has undoubtedly contributed to the 52nd front row of the Silver Arrows. However, Lewis Hamilton nuanced the advantage provided by the new block:
“We’re in the fifth year of this hybrid engine formula and the gains are getting smaller now. Everyone’s worked very hard to get it ready, but the upgrade is not the reason why we’ve put ourselves on the front row here.”
Certainly so, but the extra horses had to help the Briton's ride on Sunday, especially after the evolutions made by Ferrari, Renault and Honda in Canada. In addition, the Paul Ricard layout (consisting of long straight lines and fast corners) was well suited to the characteristics of the W09 chassis, as were Pirelli's thin-tread tyres already used in Barcelona (where Hamilton and Bottas also locked out the front row of the grid) and which will reappear in Britain in two weeks.
© F1i
A DILEMMA: RELIABILITY OR PERFORMANCE ?
After the discovery of a “quality problem” before the Canadian Grand Prix, the six M09 units were “reworked” at Brixworth, hence the name “Phase 2.1”, although, given the delays, the changes were only to be minimal compared to the model planned for Montreal.
The update concerned reliability and performance, the power gain being around two-tenths of a second, according to the team's non-executive chairman, Niki Lauda. Enough to catch up with the V6 Ferrari, which Mercedes considered more powerful at the beginning of the season?
“When you look at the [qualifying] data, the quickest car on the straight was still Kimi, said Toto Wolff. But we believe he was maybe running a different aero configuration. Three power units are pretty close together – Renault, Ferrari and ourselves – at the moment. It's about finding gains without compromising reliability, that's the trick.”
