The duo of Hamilton and Rosberg worked well together, although the team will miss the presence of Ross Brawn on the pit wall in 2014. Mercedes also discovered a chassis problem on Hamilton’s car, which accounted for some of his late season pace deficit. Hamilton took a victory in sweltering conditions in Hungary and the tyre issues were somewhat alleviated (no doubt assisted by the ‘private’ test) but the Brit struggled with feeling the car properly under braking, hindering one of Hamilton’s strongest areas. But the car was harsh on its tyres on race day, especially the rears, and this sent Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg tumbling down the order in Bahrain and Spain. The rear of the car wasn’t as extreme as the Red Bull but the Mercedes was very good at getting its tyres up to temperature, hence the run of pole positions. There were also significant personnel changes, as Norbert Haug departed in place of Toto Wolff and Niki Lauda, while Paddy Lowe joined the team from McLaren. Mercedes leapt from fifth to second, aided by increasing the windtunnel to 60% and boosting the team’s budget at the end of 2011. Mercedes AMG Petronas | Championship: 2nd, 360 points Now heavily linked with Renault - via title sponsors Infiniti - Red Bull branding now features less prominently on the car. The mechanics remained the best in the pits, although their desire for a sub two second stop – eventually achieved in Austin – meant there were a few errors, of which Mark Webber bore the brunt. The strategy team frequently bested their rivals, with Japan a key example, although the senior management did not deal well with the situation in Malaysia. The finite aspects of Red Bull’s domination of the era remained a mystery, although damp conditions in Austin briefly showed the air flow to the watching world. Webber didn’t gel with that style, which often left him playing catch-up both in qualifying and the race, with one limitation spiralling into another. Very few drivers feel comfortable with the car sliding on corner entry and correcting it by stamping on the throttle, but it’s an aspect which suits Vettel to a tee. Renault’s engine mapping enabled Sebastian Vettel to feel comfortable in turning into corners extremely early, which raised questions about traction control, although these were desperate comments rather than justifiable concerns. The car was limited early on in the season due to the lack of understanding with the tyres, but once Red Bull got their head around them – combined with the modified compounds – they stole a march on their rivals. The Red Bull RB9 – still an evolution of the 2009 RB5 – was beaten to the chequered flag just six times in 19 races and its primary strength was that it could clearly run more downforce than its rivals.
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