Mercedes warns McLaren relationship will change in 2014 F1 season
Mercedes has warned McLaren that it faces being treated as a full-on competitor rather than engine partner this year, ahead of the Woking-based team's switch to Honda power in 2015
Although Jenson Button recently called on all the Mercedes-powered Formula 1 teams to continue working together to boost their title prospects, it now looks certain that relations will be different once the season is underway.
Toto Wolff, Mercedes' executive director, has made it clear that at the moment Mercedes will co-operate with McLaren for the greater good - but dropped a firm hint that this stance will change.
"I think certainly them heading off to one of our competitors is not an ideal situation," Wolff told AUTOSPORT.
"But in these early days of the season we have a short-term target which is common - in making the power unit reliable and performing.
"It is welcome that we are all having an exchange and all sharing the same short term target, and this is to make the power unit last and be quick.
"How that is going to pan out during the season, that daily management of the relationship, could change obviously."
Mercedes sources say they are already taking extra measures to ensure that there is no risk of in-depth technical knowledge being passed on to Honda.
This has included keeping McLaren engineers well away from sensitive work on the engines that they do not need to be privy to.
Wolff did not think, however, that relations would become too difficult - or that McLaren's hopes of success would be dented.
"At the end of the day we are still competitors on track," he said.
"There is still a fair amount of knowledge that you can share on developing the power unit, but then there is a fair amount of knowledge that you wouldn't want to exchange anyway because they are switching to Honda.
"But we expect them to be strong this year."
Is this Frijns's last shot at F1?
Red Bull insists nothing major is wrong with its new Formula 1 car
Hamilton: "Way more" to be done to help progression from W Series
Seven-time Formula 1 world champion Lewis Hamilton believes “way more” needs to be done to help ensure progression from W Series and give women more opportunities in racing.
Autosport Podcast: Ranking the top 10 Arrows F1 drivers
The Arrows Formula 1 team was a mainstay of the world championship for 24 years between 1978 and 2002, with its perennial underdog status earning widespread admiration.
The under-fire F1 driver fighting for his future
Personable, articulate and devoid of the usual racing driver airs and graces, Nicholas Latifi is the last Formula 1 driver you’d expect to receive death threats, but such was the toxic legacy of his part in last year’s explosive season finale. And now, as ALEX KALINAUCKAS explains, he faces a battle to keep his place on the F1 grid…
Ferrari: F1 team orders idea discussed more outside than internally
Ferrari says the use of team orders between Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz is “more discussed outside Ferrari than inside Ferrari” as it targets parity with its Formula 1 drivers.
The under-fire F1 driver fighting for his future
Personable, articulate and devoid of the usual racing driver airs and graces, Nicholas Latifi is the last Formula 1 driver you’d expect to receive death threats, but such was the toxic legacy of his part in last year’s explosive season finale. And now, as ALEX KALINAUCKAS explains, he faces a battle to keep his place on the F1 grid…
The strange tyre travails faced by F1’s past heroes
Modern grand prix drivers like to think the tyres they work with are unusually difficult and temperamental. But, says MAURICE HAMILTON, their predecessors faced many of the same challenges – and some even stranger…
The returning fan car revolution that could suit F1
Gordon Murray's Brabham BT46B 'fan car' was Formula 1 engineering at perhaps its most outlandish. Now fan technology has been successfully utilised on the McMurtry Speirling at the Goodwood Festival of Speed, could it be adopted by grand prix racing once again?
Hamilton's first experience of turning silver into gold
The seven-time Formula 1 world champion has been lumbered with a duff car before the 2022 Mercedes. Back in 2009, McLaren’s alchemists transformed the disastrous MP4-24 into a winning car with Lewis Hamilton at the wheel. And now it’s happening again at his current team, but can the rate of progress be matched this year?
Why few could blame Leclerc for following the example of Hamilton’s exit bombshell
OPINION: Ferrari's numerous strategy blunders, as well as some of his own mistakes, have cost Charles Leclerc dearly in the 2022 Formula 1 title battle in the first half of the season. Though he is locked into a deal with Ferrari, few could blame Leclerc if he ultimately wanted to look elsewhere - just as Lewis Hamilton did with McLaren 10 years prior
The other McLaren exile hoping to follow Perez's path to a top F1 seat
After being ditched by McLaren earlier in his F1 career Sergio Perez fought his way back into a seat with a leading team. BEN EDWARDS thinks the same could be happening to another member of the current grid
How studying Schumacher helped make Coulthard a McLaren F1 mainstay
Winner of 13 grands prix including Monaco and survivor of a life-changing plane crash, David Coulthard could be forgiven for having eased into a quiet retirement – but, as MARK GALLAGHER explains, in fact he’s busier than ever, running an award-winning media company and championing diversity in motor racing. Not bad for someone who, by his own admission, wasn’t quite the fastest driver of his generation…
Could F1 move to a future beyond carbonfibre?
Formula 1 has ambitious goals for improving its carbon footprint, but could this include banishing its favoured composite material? PAT SYMONDS considers the alternatives to carbonfibre and what use, if any, those materials have in a Formula 1 setting