Mercedes W14 LEAKED! Silver Arrows bring back BLACK LIVERY as F1 car launch stream mistakenly goes public

The new Mercedes W14 was leaked roughly an hour before the launch as the team's sponsor Petronas' test live stream mistakenly went public. In a move that is going to make a lot of Lewis Hamilton fans happy, the W14 appears to have a black livery.

The German team famously goes by the name "Silver Arrows" and has used silver-gray livery while racing. This was changed for the 2020 and 2021 F1 seasons owing to the gaining momentum of the "Black Lives Matter" movement.

The team had a very impressive 2020 F1 season with the black-liveried car as Lewis Hamilton romped to the title. The 2021 F1 season was more or less successful despite the team missing out on the drivers' title.

Last season, with the introduction of the new regulations, the team reverted to the conventional silver-gray livery. Success eluded the team for the most part as the only shining light was George Russell's win in Brazil and the pole position in Hungary.

Since 2012, this was the worst placing for the German squad as the team finished the season in P3 and was even leapfrogged by Ferrari last season. There were hints by the team that the black livery could make a return this season as the social media team had given subtle hints about it.

By the looks of it, this is true as the sponsor Petronas' test stream mistakenly went public and the video showed a black-liveried car. A Twitter user shared the clip on social media with the caption:

"The Petronas motor sport youtube channel did a test live stream and leaked the W14 90 mins before the launch. #leak #W14 #lewishamiltom #georgerussell #formula1 #f1 #Oops"

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F1 fans react to the black-liveried Mercedes

Twitter went into overdrive as soon as this was released and by the looks of it, everyone is happy with the return of the black livery. Let's take a look at some of the reactions:

"The mad lads did it"

"MERCEDES W14 IS BLACK"

"Mercedes wouldn’t actually listen to us right??!! This has to be some sick twisted joke that merc are doing I refuse to believe that my team likes us that much to the point where they changed the car to black"

"omg the mercedes is black"

"Black is back???"

"At least it’s black that’s really all I wanted"

"Ha! That was hilarious, Why an alert was sent, who knows ;)"

"really hoping this is real bc damn i love the black mercedes"

"black livery, tbh i liked this one better than silver tho."