It was one of many hardest campaigns for Mercedes as they grappled with quite a few points with the W13, nevertheless when it got here to Energy Unit reliability the staff was probably the greatest of the sector.
Out of the 23 races within the season each George Russell and Lewis Hamilton solely failed to complete one race apiece: Hamilton in Abu Dhabi with a gearbox challenge, and Russell in Silverstone for abandoning his automotive after the large first lap crash with Zhou Guanyu.
It is by years of refinement because the begin of the hybrid period that Mercedes have been capable of carry on prime of reliability, however has this technique come at the price of efficiency to rivals?
An engine freeze has been in place because the begin of 2022 to chop prices, with little or no elements that may be modified till 2026.
Solely modifications to enhance reliability might be made to F1 Energy Items throughout this era.
Alpine has suffered from poor reliability all through the hybrid period, with Fernando Alonso getting his fair proportion this season in what he believes value him 60 factors over the course of the season.
The staff has admitted that it sacrificed reliability over efficiency, one thing that Govt Director Bruno Famin lately defined was the plan at Renault/Alpine to make sure they had been aggressive.
“We made modifications to the engine very shortly earlier than the brand new season. We took dangers, however the technique was clear: we needed to get again into competition with the engine,” he stated.
“With the engine freeze, our technique was to do one thing with our efficiency. We nonetheless have the likelihood to unravel reliability points and that technique was good despite the fact that we had some issues. However the engine itself had no main points.”
P4 in Constructors’ reveals efficiency beats reliability
Whereas the technique at Alpine endured a whole lot of complications all through the season with retirements, they nonetheless managed to beat McLaren because the ‘better of the remaining’ staff to P4 within the Constructors’ Championship.
Ferrari has taken a big step in engine efficiency since their midfield disappointment in 2020, whereas Honda has firmly departed from its early days with McLaren by delivering two World Championships with Purple Bull.
Mercedes has been persistently on the entrance and the benchmark for reliability, nevertheless they had been restricted in 2022 with the W13’s aerodynamic drag and porpoising within the excessive velocity corners.
The facility unit nonetheless proved to be among the many quickest, as evidenced by Williams when Alex Albon completed tenth on the Belgium Grand Prix. The velocity traps at Raidillon confirmed his automotive reaching 314.4kph.