Mercedes to take closer look at Red Bull's 'interesting' RB18 sidepods

Mercedes F1 team technical chief Mike Elliott admitted that Red Bull Racing‘s ‘interesting’ sidepods on the RB18 will be closely examined by the team.

Red Bull kept their cards close to their chest before pre-season testing. However, once at Barcelona, the teams got a look at the new car.

But more than anything, it was the aggressive sidepod design that caught the eye. Thus, Mercedes want to explore that design option.

“To be perfectly honest, I have not spent an awful lot of time looking at the other cars,” he told F1 TV Tech Talk. “We have just been trying to fix our own issues. The guys in the factory are doing more of that.

“The most visual different thing is the sidepod that Red Bull have come up with. [It] looks interesting – we will go away and have a think about that.”

“I guess there are different concepts. In terms of what is happening with these regulations, we completely change the way of managing the wheel wake.

“That was done to make it better for overtaking, that we couldn’t over-optimise and control the tyre flows, and then for that to break down behind another car.

“And different teams have taken different approaches to that: some teams have gone for these big wide bodywork, trying to control the tyre wake that way.

“We’ve gone for a narrower solution, and we’ve packaged the car to be able to do that.

“The reality is the cars will evolve a lot between now and race one and you will see different solutions come along.

“In terms of the details of what the aerodynamics are doing, it is probably all to do with controlling that front tyre wake.”

How did Mercedes fare in pre-season?

It was a good bit of pre-season testing for the defending constructor’s champions. This is due to the fact that Lewis Hamilton topped the timing charts on the final day.

However, as others have pointed out, pre-season timings mean nothing as of now. But that won’t stop people from trying to come to conclusions.

Also read: Charles Leclerc confident for 2022 F1 season but warns P1 in testing means nothing

The second and final round of pre-season testing will begin from March 10 onwards. This will give a closer indication of where teams are and where they could stand.

Still, Mercedes look in decent shape, with both Hamilton and George Russell faring well thus far.

The 2022 F1 season gets underway from March 18 onwards at Sakhir.