Mercedes reveal F1 upgrade U-turn after ‘clearly introducing some problems’ at Spa

Mercedes plan to run their new F1 upgrades when the season resumes later this month at the Dutch Grand Prix.

After introducing a new floor - and other new parts - on Friday at the Belgian Grand Prix, Mercedes reverted back to their Silverstone-specification.

This was because Mercedes struggled for pace at Spa-Francorchamps, encountering bouncing in high-speed corners.

Initially, there were suggestions that Mercedes were hit with the bouncing problem, like Ferrari have been due to their new floor upgrade.

However, trackside engineering chief Andrew Shovlin doesn’t think the upgrades were totally to blame for their problems.

“We are planning to do that,” he said in the team’s latest post-race debrief video. “The reason we reverted the car to the Silverstone spec on Friday night was because we had a good race in Silverstone. Spa and Silverstone are not dramatically different circuits in terms of the corner speed range that you are dealing with.

“We had clearly introduced some problems somewhere. We think that was largely due to how we were running the car in Spa, not induced by the updates themselves.

“That was giving us a bit of bouncing in the high-speed corners, as well as a few issues with the balance. Going to that Silverstone car got it all back to normal.”

It proved to be a masterstroke as Lewis Hamilton clinched his second victory of the 2024 F1 season after Mercedes took a 1-2 on track before George Russell’s disqualification.

Mercedes will use the summer break to “look at the data” as they plan to re-introduce them at Zandvoort.

“We have since had time to look at the data to understand what it was that we did, and we are pretty confident that we will be going for a re-introduction in Zandvoort,” he added.

Only Red Bull have won more races than Mercedes in 2024 - a remarkable turnaround given they failed to finish on the podium up until the Canadian Grand Prix in June.