Mercedes under no illusions: Our golden era cannot be repeated

Mercedes can now put the misery of the ground-effect era firmly behind them. After four years, they are back to winning championships and, although they would like to keep doing so in the years ahead, they know that repeating their successful run at the start of the hybrid era will not be possible. The sport now has safeguards against that sort of dominance.

It is in the best interests of commercial rights holders Liberty Media to prevent the sort of sustained dominance Mercedes enjoyed. Several mechanisms have therefore been introduced into the regulations: the cost cap, wind tunnel and CFD testing allocations, and the ADUO system to help equalise power unit performance. None of these mechanisms is perfectly calibrated yet, and the FIA is constantly looking for ways to improve the system, but their combined effect was already closing the gaps and shaking up the order in the previous era.

In 2025, Mercedes knew they would end the ground-effect era without a title. That allowed them to concentrate on the new regulations, while McLaren and Red Bull fought for the drivers’ championship until the final race of the season. “I think one of the things that made us strong this year was that we hadn’t been winning in the previous years,” reflected Andrew Shovlin in Sao Paulo.

Everyone has their turn at the top. Mercedes’ trackside engineering director expects staying ahead of the other teams to be very difficult. “You’ve got to look at it as, ‘How are we going to beat ourselves next year? What are we going to do that would actually allow us to push forward and bring forward a better team?’”

“It’s difficult because it’s tight. You’ve seen Ferrari have very strong races, McLaren today and Red Bull recently. But we will take nothing for granted,” stressed the experienced engineer. “I think to do the run that we did in the past of eight championships is really impossible with the way the sport is now, with the cost cap.”

“But we’ll try and do the same again. Work hard, assume you’re going to get beaten if you don’t do the best job, and we’ll try and do the best job,” he assured Silver Arrows fans.

Since the start of July, Mercedes have had fewer wind tunnel hours and less computing time for CFD simulations available, which will affect their performance next year. They can, however, avoid that impact if the factory can work more efficiently than before.

But they must do so without exceeding the budget. “It does peg you back, but it leads to exciting racing because it’s harder to kind of dominate in the way that teams have in the past. But it’s just something you’ve got to work around,”