F1 | Mercedes: “Updates will arrive in Austria”

The mandatory break due to the coronavirus has significantly changed the teams' plans also with regards to the development of the single-seaters. In fact, together with the International Automobile Federation, the teams had also decided to impose a stop period for both the aerodynamic/chassis and engine departments and, even today, a large part of the staff is working remotely to reduce as much as possible the possibilities for contact, which naturally also has an impact on development work.

However, that doesn't mean that the cars in Austria will be identical to those we saw in Australia for what was supposed to be the first race of the season. The teams, in fact, even before the imposition of the pause were working on some update packages, as explained by Mercedes and it is possible that we will see part of these developments already in Austria: "During these nine weeks of shutdown, the Formula 1 teams was not allowed to develop the machine. However, Australia's W11 design was one that had been planned around the winter period, due to the time required for the production and testing of various components, meaning the team had already been developing the car for around three months before the start of the shutdown period” – explained Mercedes leaders in a statement -. “In other words, by the time the car was about to hit the track in Melbourne, we had already found a bit of extra performance in the wind tunnel and in our simulations. Other teams will have had similar experiences and all rivals will now be looking to get the maximum out of their cars for the first race in Austria.”