Mercedes clearly had the advantage for the 2015 F1 season

Lewis Hamilton, second from left, got off to a fast start over teammate, Nico Rosberg, right, and secured the 2015 Formula One drivers’ title in the United States. The Constructors’ title had been cliShow more

ABU DHABI // It is hard to believe that two years ago Lewis Hamilton cut such a despondent figure in the Yas Marina Circuit paddock following the conclusion of the 2013 Formula One Etihad Airways Grand Prix.

The Briton had finished a distant seventh in his Mercedes-GP, struggling desperately for grip as he finished 80 seconds behind race winner Sebastian Vettel.

“I was just too slow. Just no pace,” he had said post-race as he reflected on also being beaten comfortably by teammate Nico Rosberg, who finished third.

Of his future prospects, he added: “I’m just hoping, with the tyres and the car, we can do some work over the winter and make the car work for me a bit better.”

It is fair to say, as the F1 fraternity begins arriving in the capital for this weekend’s final round of the 2015 season, that Mercedes did manage to make the car work “a bit better” for Hamilton.

Mercedes have dominated the past two seasons, and in Sunday’s 55-lap race they will bid to equal the record they set last year of 16 victories in a calendar year.

The constructors’ title was retained with four races to spare, in Russia, while Hamilton won his second successive drivers’ crown, and third overall, at the United States Grand Prix in Austin last month.

Fifteen wins from 18 races, 17 pole positions, 11 one-two finishes, 12 fastest laps are the impressive statistics of what has been a one-sided campaign.

The W06 chassis has proven the class of the field, supported by the 1.6-litre V6 power unit, and Singapore apart, when they struggled with grip on the streets of the Marina Bay Circuit, they have been the car to beat at every race in 2015.

Their raw pace advantage in qualifying has allowed them to control races from the front in a season where track position has been crucial, with overtaking difficult due to the fragile nature of the Pirelli tyre compounds meaning they wear out quickly when running closely behind a car ahead.

It has not happened often to Hamilton and Rosberg this year, but when they have been stuck in traffic they have found it hard to gain position, despite having a big performance advantage.

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But, save for a string of slow starts from both drivers mid-season apart, it has rarely been an issue for Mercedes, particularly Hamilton, as the team have dominated.

It has not always made for entertaining viewing, sadly, with the Mercedes drivers regularly running line astern from the front, gradually leaving their opposition behind as the afternoon progresses.

But that is not the fault of Mercedes. You can only beat what is in front of you, and in all honesty, other than the Ferrari of Sebastian Vettel, the only non-Mercedes to win a race this season, and the occasional cameo at the front of the field from Daniel Ricciardo’s Red Bull Racing car, they have had little threat.

Which has been a shame, as Vettel and Ferrari have proven this season that if they can get close to Mercedes they crack under pressure.

In Malaysia, in March, Mercedes got their pit strategy wrong, and were not fast enough to reel Vettel back in; in Monaco they panicked and pitted Hamilton under a safety car period late in proceedings, a result that cost them a one-two finish.

This is Year 2 of the Mercedes era, and barring mechanical unreliability or a collision between Hamilton and Rosberg in Sunday’s race, they will sign off with another victory.

But they still have some way to go to match Ferrari’s reign of superiority between 2000 and 2004 when they won five successive drivers’ and constructors’ championships, winning 56 out of 82 races.

There was also McLaren, who between 1988 and 1991 won all the major titles, the highlight for them being in 1988 when they won 15 out of 16 races, a 93.75 per cent win rate, which is the highest for any team in a single F1 season. And, of course, Red Bull’s recent run of success, between 2010 and 2013, where they won 42 races on their way to mopping up all the silverware.

The nature of F1 is that Mercedes’s era of domination will come to an end at some point, just as the ones enjoyed by Ferrari, Red Bull Racing and McLaren did, too. But the real reasons of why Mercedes have stayed at the top is their ability to see the bigger picture.

Toto Wolff, the Mercedes executive director, is not basking in the success of this season and is already thinking about the impending threat from Ferrari next year.

“I am anticipating a tough challenge with Ferrari in 2016,” he told F1’s website last month. “They have done some clever moves – and yes, they have definitely caught up.

“So they will be a very important competitor; a very welcome competitor.”

Wolff, in public at least, is encouraged by the turnaround in form of Ferrari, but behind that show of sportsmanship, you know he does not really mean it.

Sport is about striving to be the best in your field and then staying there.

Wolff will not want Mercedes to give up their mantle as top dog, and he and the rest of the German marque will be plotting how they can achieve a similar level of accomplishment to what they have done over the past two seasons.

But the mission, for now at least, is to finish off 2015 in style by doing what they do best in Abu Dhabi: going very fast and notching up another victory.

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