Mercedes not opposed to relaxing F1 engine freeze

Mercedes are not opposed to relaxing Formula One’s engine freeze.

Ahead of the Italian Grand Prix Renault joined Ferrari in calling for the current engine freeze to be lifted.

Under the current regulations, after a certain date in the calendar, Formula One engine manufacturers are not allowed to make any further developments to their engines.

Engine suppliers are limited to only being able to make alterations to engine mapping and software, with any changes to mechanical parts limited to special occasions with advanced permission in the case of reliability, safety or cost.

Since the change in regulations for 2014 with the introduction of the new turbocharged V6 hybrid power-unit era, Mercedes have dominated, either with their own car or with customer teams Williams, McLaren and Force India.

Ahead of the race in Monza Autosport Magazine compiled a table of engine performance with Mercedes claiming 9 victories to Renault’s 3. Taking all 12 pole positions this season, 10 fastest laps with Renault and Ferrari taking one each, with Mercedes claiming 26 podium finishes in comparison to Renault’s 8 and Ferrari’s 2.

In terms of Grand Prix laps led, Mercedes dominance is even further illustrated with 639 laps led, ahead of Renault’s 71 and Ferrari’s 32.

Obviously with Mercedes dominating, rivals Ferrari and Renault called for the engine freeze to be lifted, to improve competition.

First was Ferrari Team principal Marco Mattiacci and then new Renault Sport managing director Cyril Abiteboul [formally of Caterham] also backed the call.

That proposal was obviously put towards Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff, who to a point at least, backed the calls from Ferrari and Renault.

By the time the Italian Grand Prix had ended Mercedes powered cars had taken seven of the ten points paying positions over the race weekend.

In qualifying the top six cars were all powered by Mercedes, with the factory team locking out the front row ahead of Williams and McLaren.

During the race Lewis Hamilton set the fastest lap for Mercedes whilst all 53 laps were led by the Mercedes duo of Nico Rosberg and Hamilton.

But whilst Ferrari and Renault want to lift the engine freeze to close the gap to Mercedes, the German manufacturers confidence, may well suggest that the Silver Arrows believe that they can improve their power-unit even further.

Speaking to Sky Sports F1 Midweek Report programme Wolff said: ?We are going to reconvene and discuss properly and see what we do, but we are pretty open to everything.?

?Why not? [improve the Mercedes power-unit] If we at the same time can work on our engine then we have no problem, You don’t want it to be like GP2 where you have standard engines, so you either open it up and everyone develops in the way they think it should develop or you freeze it. So we are open for both directions.?