16/10/2020
NEWS STORY
As debate continues over the greatest F1 driver of all time, surely the Mercedes W11, along with a number of its predecessors, must rank amongst the greatest F1 cars.
Last Sunday witnessed the first DNF of the season, but even so, Lewis Hamilton is the only driver to have completed all 651 racing laps, while the team has completed 96.8% of the season's 1,302.
With 21 finishes from 22 starts, no less than 20 of those finishes have been in the points. And on the subject of points, the German team has a 180 point advantage over its nearest rival (Red Bull) and 311 over pre-season favourite Ferrari.
Thankfully, at least for an opposition that weekend after weekend is forced further into the shade, there will be no further updates to the car.
"We finished them a long time ago," said Toto Wolff when asked about further upgrades that might be in the pipeline.
"That has always been in the past what we looked at," he added. "It's a very thoroughly, thought-through decision because not in every championship can you afford to close the book early.
"But the rules change quite a lot for next year and, in that respect, we decided to, like in the previous years, switch to next year's car.
"This is why you can see the shift in performance between the teams," he added, a clear reference to Red Bull's recent signs of closing the gap. "We are always having a very strong start and middle of the season and then whoever continues to develop is strong at the end."