Edited By: Amrit Santlani
Last Updated: February 15, 2023, 16:33 IST
Mercedes F1 team with their new W14 (Source: Mercedes F1 Team Twitter)
Mercedes unveiled the first look of their W14 that Lewis Hamilton and George Russell will drive during F1 2023 season
Mercedes have unveiled their first look at the all-black Formula One car which Lewis Hamilton and teammate George Russell will drive in the upcoming campaign.
After last year in silver saw the motorsports giant fall behind in the title race to its competitors like Red Bull and Ferrari, Mercedes have returned to its black livery scheme.
Both the British racers, Hamilton and Russell will hope to bounce back in the 2023 F1 campaign as they fell to a third-place finish last term, having dominated from 2014 to 2021.
Mercedes have gone with the W14 which Hamilton and Russell will drive as the former looks to seal a record-breaking eighth F1 crown having finished sixth last term, his worst-ever.
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On Wednesday morning, the covers were taken off the W14 as Mercedes unveiled their beast at the Silverstone having struggled to keep pace with F1’s many rules changes last season.
Speaking on the return of the black livery, Hamilton stated that his team simply ‘meant business’.
“We’ve redesigned, optimised, and innovated so many parts of the car and that is impressive, and I love the new livery! It says, ‘we mean business’,” stated the seven-time F1 champ.
After two years in black in 2020 and 2021, Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff stated last year that going forward their colours would be silver and black.
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Following their stand against racism in black, the livery returns once again and Wolff stated that ‘history will repeat itself’.
“We were overweight last year. This year we have tried to figure out where we can squeeze out every single gram. So now, history repeats itself,” he said.
“The colour black became part of our DNA at that point, so we are pleased to return to it,” Wolff added.
Hamilton and Russell would be getting their hands on the mean machine at the Northamptonshire circuit later in the day.
The first much-anticipated race of the F1 2023 campaign will be the Bahrain GP on March 5, but before that the pre-testing will be done later this month between the 23rd to 25th.
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