Mercedes expects the form fluctuations between Formula 1 teams to continue in the Singapore Grand Prix as it struggled at Monza last time out. Behind runaway championship leaders Red Bull, Mercedes is locked in a battle with Aston Martin, Ferrari and McLaren with each team providing the closest opposition to Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez on any given weekend. Mercedes has tended to run stronger on the high-downforce circuits, such as Barcelona, where Lewis Hamilton and George Russell were second and third, the team's best result this season. In the Italian Grand Prix, Russell took a comfortable fifth while Hamilton battled the McLaren duo of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri as well as Williams' Alexander Albon, eventually coming home in fifth place while Ferrari enjoyed its strongest weekend of the year. F1 now embarks on the flyaway races to end the season, with Mercedes Trackside Engineering Director Andrew Shovlin believing the Singapore GP will continue the trend.
Shovlin's expectations
"It seems that when we go to the low downforce settings, Ferrari get more competitive. In Monza, it looked like they had one-and-a-half to two-and-a-half tenths of performance on us," Shovlin explained. "There is a reason to think that the car will work better and that is because Singapore is a maximum downforce circuit. "Our performance at the high downforce tracks like at Barcelona, Budapest, and even Zandvoort the car was working well, and we've had pretty strong performance. "We’re hoping to be able to be a bit quicker there and get back to a position where we can challenge for podiums. "The track though does throw up some pretty unique challenges and we've also got some layout changes for this year. "There is a sequence of four corners near the end of the lap that have been removed where the track used to go underneath a grandstand through a tunnel. "That's now gone so we've got a longer straight which will change a little bit how the tyres are working. "There is a bit less energy there but it's also an abrasive tarmac. We've got the softest three compounds so it's a pretty tough race on the tyres and it's also a bumpy street circuit. "Added to that, the race is run at night. "[There are] plenty of challenges for us to try and tackle then but we are going there optimistic for a strong performance."
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