‘Lewis is haunted by the need to succeed'

MERCEDES HAS DOMINATED F1 WITH VIRTUOSO TEAMWORK, DUE IN NO SMALL PART TO TECHNICAL, GENIUS JAMES ALLISON. BUT JUST AS HE PREPARES TO STEP ASIDE, THE MOMENTUM IS SWINGING TOWARDS RED BULL...

- TOM CLARKSON

STATISTICS don’t lie. At least they don’t in Formula 1. Take away the hot air and bluster and you’re left with raw stats. They are the mechanism by which success is measured in this sport, and they don’t come much more impressive than those generated by Mercedes-AMG. The team has won seven consecutive driver and constructor titles since 2014. It’s been the greatest unbroken run of domination in the sport’s history; even greater than the strangleholds of McLaren, Williams and Ferrari in the ’80s, ’90s and ’00s.

For those who haven’t been following closely, the titles have been no fluke. Merc has taken 105 victories since the start of ’14, which is more than 50 percent of the races. Ferrari has been Mercedes’ closest challenger in the hybrid era, and it has won just 20 races.

Lewis Hamilton has knocked up six titles in that time. His speed and consistency have toppled all before him, except the anomaly of 2014 when Nico Rosberg clinched the title at the final race. But Lewis has continued to raise the bar every year.

And so has Mercedes. It has improved its cars at a similar rate to its rivals, despite being closer to the edge of the performance envelope. And this on a level-ish playing field: Merc’s budget has been in the same ballpark as those of Ferrari and Red Bull; its factories a similar size. Mercedes certainly doesn’t have bespoke tyres or its own track on which to test ad nauseum – as was the case when Ferrari won everything in the 2000s.