The Future of Mercedes in Motorsport?
@motorsport PRESENTER: @darnscotty
DTMexit
Mercedes has decided to withdraw from the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters (DTM) championship at the end of the 2018 season and enter the electric Formula E Championship in the 2019/2020 season.
Internationale Tourenwagen Rennen (ITR), the organizers and promoters of DTM, stated that even though they regretted to see them go, did they respect their decision in a sporting and fair way. This should give ITR enough time to figure out the future of DTM.
"Although leaving is tough for all of us, we will be doing everything during this season and next to make sure we win as many DTM titles as possible before we go. We owe that to our fans and to ourselves." ~ Toto Wolff Mercedes Motorsport Boss
Mercedes said in a statement that their move out of DTM is a strategic one, as when they join the electric Formula E Championship, will they be competing at both ends of the motorsport spectrum.
Mercedes, whose Formula 1 team is World Champions for the last three years, would like to compete in both fossil fuel and futuristic electric formula championships. Both races push the engineers and designers to the maximum in advancing technology for the future. Improving battery life, performance etc.
The future of DTM?
DTM is filled with three of the best upper market motor vehicle manufacturers, who coincidentally were all born in Germany. The three of them have been battling it out for decades by pushing each other to the limits.
Audi. BMW. Mercedes.
They would take their meanest touring cars, plop a wide body kit on it, add some more technical gadgets I would not understand, grab the best drivers they could fine and race. The news has come as a shock to Audi and BMW and their future in the series or the series itself is very unclear.
The last time there were two manufacturers battling it out, Mercedes and Audi, was from 2006 to 2011. BMW joined at the start of 2012. It has to be the three of them. I mean, who else is there? Opel? VW? Porsche?
Formula E Entry
The deadline for Mercedes to reach its final decision to join the electric racers is in October this year. HWA, the customization specialists of Mercedes, is currently evaluating the championship. Formula E has already attracted a lot of competitors like BMW, Jaguar, Audi and Renault.
Toto Wolff, Mercedes motorsport boss, said that starting Formula E in 2019 will give them enough time to properly understand the championship and prepare for their entry the right way.
What is the right way? According to Toto, to be the benchmark in the premium segment and explore new innovative projects. One project is to combine Formula 1 and Formula E in order to promote current and future technologies.
Formula 1 Exit Rumors
The DTM exit announcement has caused wide spread panic in regards to Mercedes’ future in motor sport. Rumors started spreading of Mercedes leaving Formula 1, but Mercedes put an end to it. They announced that last winter, Mercedes signed a long term deal with their title sponsor Petronas which is set to run for another three years.
Toto Wolff said in an interview recently that “We are not leaving F1, none of our sponsors is leaving F1, we are pretty happy where we are.”
Conclusion
Mercedes would like to dominate fossil fuel and future electric motor sport races while promoting their current and latest technologies. All race development technologies filter down to every day cars and in turn do we all benefit off it. In turn Mercedes is rewarded financially.
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