Will Mercedes drive with one hand?

After last year’s dominant season, when Formula One introduced new six-cylinder turbo engines, Mercedes continued its dominance in Australia’s first race of the year.

Judging by the results, the rivals did not get much closer to the Silver Arrows over the winter, and at Red Bull, quarreling with their engine supplier, who, with a growing desire for his factory team, hides the data, instead of looking for solutions together, showed their displeasure over the seemingly insurmountable the difference between race cars.

Renault’s powertrain, which is used at Red Bull, is said to be a hefty 100 horsepower weaker than Mercedes ’(1,7 seconds slower per lap if translated into time), so team boss Christian Horner said international the FIA ​​Automobile Federation, and to equalize the huge differences between the engines.

The FIA ​​has done this in the past, in 2009, when Renault, like this year, found itself lagging behind the others, but in different circumstances. The French manufacturer at the time strictly adhered to the freeze on engine development, while Ferrari, BMW and Mercedes skillfully exploited loopholes in the rules and, under the pretext of allowed upgrades to increase engine reliability, gained 30 horsepower.

A similar story was repeated in 2010, but the FIA ​​then decided that teams and engine manufacturers should find solutions to their differences, but the only solution would be to reduce the power of the most powerful engine in the caravan.

Mercedes, which after the equalization of power in 2009 the following season again accumulated 18 horsepower advantage (supposed to have 755), was of course not satisfied with this, but later there was nothing with the equalization of power.

This year’s Silver Arrows form is daunting and Bernie Ecclestone, in fear of an even bigger loss of viewers, has already sided with Red Bull. The head of Formula One even explained that the German manufacturer had a certain advantage over its competitors when introducing new engines, as Mercedes' men and the FIA ​​umbrella organization worked together to come up with the idea of ​​new engines and knew what modern engines would look like.

Many racers are also dissatisfied, who would definitely rather fight for victories and the title of champion than for the last place on the winners' stage.

But at Mercedes camp, they realize that their superiority could hurt Formula One, which is already limping anyway, as if it had been shot in the knee and losing spectators, as if it were losing blood from a gunshot wound. After the race in Australia, Nico Rosberg said that they will probably lead in the next races and that they will do everything to keep it that way. But he added that they are aware that it would be good if the others approached them, though not too much. After an interesting exchange of words about dominance with Sebastian Vettl, Rosberg insisted that Ferrari’s resistance was important to the sport and spectators. “If they approach us, it will be good for everyone,” he said.

This makes us think that at Mercedes, we could try to drive more restrained in the next races, thus spice up what was going on. It would be enough to limit the power of the engine during the race, which would of course extend the life of them and thus perhaps achieve the desired at least 90% reliability, although it would be more likely to drive the whole season without failure.

Already in the qualifiers, where no points are shared, they might be able to leave the first places to the competitors, knowing that they can jump into the lead whenever they want. With such a strong and fast car, you could intentionally lose a few more places after the start, and then after half of the race you could slowly make your way forward. This would give viewers their show, rivals the false hope of catching Mercedes, Ecclestone would increase earnings, and Mercedes would easily win both titles in the end anyway.

Doing so is fairly common in races, but in the domain of team rival duels. In Australia, for example, Lewis Hamilton drove only so fast that Rosberg could not catch him and they drove close to the finish line one after the other. If we both did the same thing, at least outwardly it would look like we were watching a completely even race.