Mercedes trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin opens up about Lewis Hamilton's proposal over upgraded front wing

Amid the ongoing speculation around the relationship between Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton, a team engineer has revealed the details of the choice of driver for the upgraded front wing at Monaco. After the 78-lap race in Monte Carlo, Hamilton has raised eyebrows by hinting at unequal treatment within the team. 

Now, speaking about the upgrade and why George Russell was chosen to run with upgrades, Mercedes' trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin said that the decision was made by Hamilton itself. He said, “We are looking to have race quantities of that wing in Montreal and normally you would say race quantities is at least three because you have got one for each car and then you have got a spare available should anything happen.”

“We do not make three in one go. We make the first, then the second, then the third. An upshot of that was that we had one that we could bring to Monaco and have it ready for Friday to do the weekend.”

“A while ago, the drivers asked why we always wait until we have got a full set. Why not just let one of us run it? We agreed with them that given the situation with the team in terms of performance, we need to improve, and we need to learn. It is quite good to have different specs on the car to do that.”

“Hamilton made it easy for us”, says Andrew Shovlin

Further speaking about the confusion and process of choosing a driver Andrew Shovlin said that Lewis Hamilton opted out of using the upgraded front wing and that made things easy for the team. 

He said, “We did agree with the drivers that where we are now, we will be happy to bring one to the track and they were both happy with that. The difficult question was how we decided who was going to run it. 

“But Lewis said, if we are going to start doing this where we have not got enough parts, let George run it in Monaco, there will be races in the future where we have a single update and of course, we just alternate from here on in. But Lewis made that decision quite simple for us.”