Red Bull chief insists Lewis Hamilton and Mercedes are still F1 title contenders

The head of Red Bull’s driver development program Helmut Marko fully believes that Sir Lewis Hamilton and Mercedes are still title contenders, despite their poor start to the 2022 season.

Mercedes, winners of the last eight Constructors’ Championships, have started this year’s campaign far off the pace of rivals Ferrari and Red Bull, with their W13 machine suffering from ‘porpoising’ issues where the car bounces up and down on the track uncontrollably.

Based on the first two races of the season in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, the team don’t look in any shape to challenge for titles, even with seven-time world champion Hamilton and promising Brit George Russell at the wheel.

The German team have struggled to adapt to the new regulations brought in for this season, yet Marko is sure that they will recover sooner rather than later.

The Austrian has faced a similar situation at Red Bull in 2014 when, after winning four consecutive Drivers’ and Constructors’ Championships, the team struggled massively to even win races and it wasn’t until last year that they finally broke Mercedes’ grip with Max Verstappen pipping Hamilton to the title.

‘You have to distinguish between the two cases,’ said Marko when speaking to Formel1.de.

‘The post-2013 era coincided with the new engine rules and Mercedes had incredible dominance at that stage. They were up to two seconds ahead of everyone, but logically they didn’t show it.

‘Now, with the change of chassis and engine, the differences are not so big. Mercedes can no longer click and suddenly it’s a party for them. But the team are very well positioned and also have some really important people in the chassis area.’

Marko, who has personally overseen the progression of several great Formula 1 drivers,