“In our motor department they were a bit annoyed”- Mercedes chief designer on Ferrari challenge

“In our motor department they were a bit annoyed”- Mercedes chief designer says that his team had to push further to beat Ferrari challenge.

Mercedes, since the start of the hybrid era, have been the dominant side. By the end of the last decade, Ferrari started to challenge its hegemony and eventually developed a better power unit.

Though it only for a brief frame of time, as the restrictions posed by FIA led Ferrari to trail below in the manufacturer’s race, propelling Mercedes to rise back again.

The Brackley based team’s chief designer John Owen that his side was a bit annoyed by the challenge posed by Ferrari, and eventually pushed harder to be back on the top.

“In our motor department they were a bit annoyed and felt challenged because they no longer had the best engine,” Owen told Motorsport.com.

“They weren’t happy about that, so we worked hard to turn it around. That has really been a matter of blood, sweat and tears.”

The team pushed itself to unhealthy zones to beat Ferrari.

Adding on to what Owen said, Toto Wolff in a recent interview with Autosport revealed that his team was determined to beat Ferrari, and eventually dragged itself to the unhealthy zone to be on the top.

“I would say at certain stages, overstretched into unhealthy territory with the support of MGP, where chassis related items to the power unit needed to be developed,” said Wolff.

“I think we just pushed ourselves so hard that we made a big step over the winter and, in a certain way, it’s ironic that we got pushed so much by the ones that fell back in 2020.”

It can be said that Mercedes was able to accomplish its desires by winning the championship once again in 2019. Meanwhile, Ferrari had a disappointing season by finishing P6 on the constructors’ table.

About the author

Tanish Chachra

Tanish Chachra is the Motorsport editor at The SportsRush. He saw his first race when F1 visited India in 2011, and since then, his romance with the sport has been seasonal until he took up this role in 2020. Reigniting F1's coverage on this site, Tanish has fallen in love with the sport all over again. He loves Kimi Raikkonen and sees a future world champion in Oscar Piastri. Away from us, he loves to snuggle inside his books.

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