Mercedes customer teams, McLaren and Williams, faced difficulties keeping up with the performance of the works team with its engine during the Formula 1 Australian GP, revealing a significant technical challenge for the first races of the 2026 season.
Read more TCR: Title defense begins with a victory in Curvelo for Leonel Pernía
Williams boss James Vowles admitted that Mercedes’ work on its power unit caught the team by surprise: “What Mercedes is doing on the power unit caught us off guard. Only in the qualifying session were we really able to realize how far behind we were. This probably represents three-tenths of a second, more or less,” said Vowles.
Despite the clear performance gap, Vowles reinforced his confidence in Mercedes’ transparency: “I am confident that Mercedes has provided us with everything we need, because they are very meticulous. What they have provided gives us the ability to do what they are doing. At the moment, I don’t know how to do that, and that’s what we’re working on behind the scenes, trying to figure out what we missed and how to get there faster.”
He also highlighted that the responsibility for exploring the engine’s full potential lies with Williams itself: “It’s not an open door, as one might imagine, because that is Mercedes’ foundation. Therefore, it is up to us to work around it. We need to recognize that we at Williams do not have the sophistication they possess in different temperature conditions. This is definitely our responsibility, not theirs,” Vowles concluded.
Read more Rafael Câmara finishes debut F2 weekend with a podium in Australia
Andrea Stella, McLaren team principal, corroborated Vowles’ position, highlighting that his team has also been acting reactively to the power unit: “The discussion with HPP-Mercedes about having more information has been going on for weeks, because even in testing, we basically went to the track, ran the car, analyzed the data and thought: ‘Okay, this is what we have. Well, now we react to what we have,’ but that’s not how you work in Formula 1,” Stella said.
He added that, with the new rules, McLaren feels for the first time that it is at a disadvantage as a customer team: “I have to say that since we have been a customer team, it is the first time we feel we are behind, even in our ability to predict how the car will behave and anticipate improvements,” Stella concluded.
Mercedes celebrated a one-two finish in Melbourne with George Russell and Kimi Antonelli, while McLaren saw Lando Norris finish fifth, and Oscar Piastri retire on the formation lap after crashing on his own, and Williams finished with Alex Albon in 12º and Carlos Sainz in 15º.
Read more F1: Hamilton downplays missed pit stop and hails 4° in Australia
