Mercedes reveal 'close cousin' plans after momentum swing

Mercedes trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin has confirmed next season's car is "likely to be a close cousin" of the W15.

The 50-year-old explained this was due to increased confidence the team can "carry the momentum" it has generated over the past few races into 2025.

In recent months, the Brackley-based squad has unearthed considerable performance gains. In doing so, the team has vaulted itself into regular race-winning contention with three victories in the past four grand prix.

After struggling to reach the heights of the eight consecutive constructors' titles the team won between 2014 and 2021 since the ground-effect era was re-introduced to F1, the German marque has turned a developmental corner.

Mercedes is now more likely to stick than twist again as it prepares to mount a championship challenge in the final season of the current regulatory era.

"Given that the recent developments have been successful at bringing the performance we hoped, and next year's car is likely to be a close cousin of this year's car, we're now more confident that we can carry this momentum into next year, more so than we have been in the previous years," Shovlin told select media including RacingNews365.

Mercedes has a 'reasonable route for finding performance'

Mercedes' current form is a striking departure from how the team started the current season. After the opening eight rounds of the year, a pair of fifth-place finishes for George Russell was the high point for the German outfit.

However, starting with the 26-year-old's podium at the Canadian Grand Prix, Mercedes has reached the rostrum at each of the past six, winning three of them.

Whilst the start of the year was not unique for Mercedes in the contemporary ground-effects era, nor is the fact it has seen performance gains throughout the campaign, the extent of which has allowed it to develop its 2024 car.

Shovlin believes the team has finally been able to understand and tackle its early-season difficulties, despite the frustration of again launching a car that was not up to standard.

"The baseline wasn't very good," he said when detailing the cause of Mercedes' poor start to the season.

"I think we've done a good job of understanding the issues and getting on top of them. We've clearly got a reasonable route for finding performance now.

"The frustration is it was the third year in a row where we launched a car that wasn't as good as we needed it to be. But we've learned a lot through this process."