In an ominous sign for its rivals, Mercedes tech boss James Allison has revealed that the team is expected to field an updated W11 in Austria.
The Silver Arrows squad exited pre-season testing in Barcelona at the top of the timesheet and decked out as the favourite to take top honors in Australia.
The COVID-19 pandemic brought the season to a standstill even before it kicked into gear, forcing teams into a premature shut-down of their factories.
But with preparations now in full swing for the opening race of the F1 world championship in Austria in two weeks, Mercedes is focused on implementing updates on its W11, most of which were developed before the season was halted.
"We haven't yet done a single race, but actually quite a lot of time has passed since we launched this car," Allison explained ina video posted on Mercedes' YouTube channel.
"If you imagine where the launch car was and the car that would have gone to Australia, that was frozen around about Christmas.
"So there was the whole of January, whole of February, March, all making the car quicker in the wind tunnel and also in the design departments.
"We got quite a lot of ideas about how to make it quicker, and quite a lot of those ideas were already in process through the design office before we were forced to shut down nine weeks ago.
"Our challenge now is to make sure that quarter-of-a-year of development can get off the drawing boards and onto the car as swiftly as possible.
"We hope to have a chunk of that for the first race in Austria, and the season that follows will of course take as much of the development as fast as we can get it onto the car in turn."
Allison said the forced hiatus had exacerbated his sense of anticipation of how the new-spec 2020 Silver Arrow will perform when it returns to the track at the Red Bull Ring next month.
"I'm itching for the team to get back out on the track and find out whether the work we did has produced a car that we can all be excited and proud of. I just can't wait for that," Allison said.
"In terms of feeling ready for it physically, nine weeks off work just sort of kicking it around in my garden and seeing the sun for the first time in many many months has left me feeling quite healthy and full of beans.
"And I think that will be true right across the team and for the drivers too who will have had little to do except work on their physical condition."
©Mercedes
Allison suggested the prolonged period of inactivity had perhaps taken a bigger toll on the drivers than on other team members.
"I suspect mentally it's tougher for the drivers than for the team, this period of waiting," Allison said.
"For the drivers, all the peaks of emotion are amplified, the highs are higher, the lows are lower. To get yourself ready to go at the start of a season, and then have it taken away from you the way that it was in Melbourne, that's tough I think for the drivers to take.
"It will be a sign of their resilience and competitiveness to see them bristle back to work with all the vim and vigour that is necessary to be right on it from the start.
"I have little doubt both Lewis and Valtteri will be ready to go when it matters in Austria."
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