Mercedes-Red Bull power trick: the gain was around 2 cents. Antonelli relieved: “It was stressful”

New details The British site The Race has revealed new and interesting details regarding the case involving the Mercedes and Red Bull powered teams, who in the first three rounds of the season used a clever trick in qualifying to make the most of all the electric power available to their power units. The trick – just to refresh your memory – consisted in benefiting from the 350 kW power of the electrical component for a handful of seconds more, avoiding the gradual decrease in power to zero but instead using a sudden shutdown of the MGU-K. The solution was permitted by the regulation which, however, to avoid abuse, required that the electronic control unit go into protection in the event that the MGU-K suddenly ran out of energy. This was the reason why this solution was only used in qualifying, when the important thing was to finish the fast lap at maximum power, ‘accepting’ the price of a very slow subsequent lap. Now the use of this solution has been banned and in Miami no team will be allowed to use it. The reasons are related to safety and The Race revealed how even some of those directly involved are actually happy with this ban. The English site quoted the words of Andrea Kimi Antonelli, who defined the situation in which he found himself using this ploy as “stressful”: “Especially in Suzuka I was an easy target in certain corners, given that the track is not very wide and that the space available to overtake is really limited. It was quite stressful not being able to do anything. Because obviously the car didn’t respond to any commands. I was going very slowly on the track and it was a moment of great tension.” The game wasn’t worth the candle. According to the World Championship leader, the game risked not being worth the candle, given that the chronometric advantage that guaranteed the use of the 350 kW for a few more seconds was actually minimal: “It’s a relief to know that we probably won’t find ourselves in a similar situation again – commented Antonelli – this involves a loss of perhaps a couple of hundredths of a second, therefore very little time, but at least it gives the certainty that something like this won’t happen again. Furthermore, in qualifying [con questo sistema] it’s easy to hinder someone during a lap and therefore receive a penalty. And that’s certainly not what you want.”