Toto Wolff has shed some light on Mercedes’ problems. He reports the mood is “up and down” within the Mercedes camp as they struggle to battle the car’s inconsistencies.
George Russell topped FP1 in Mexico, but were overtaken by McLaren, Ferrari and Max Verstappenduring the third and final free practice session. Similar happened in the United States when Hamilton looked like one of the favourites for pole position, but failed to escape Q1.
Why are Mercedes struggling?
“I think the car has a very narrow band where it really functions well, so when you hit that lap or session, we’re quick. You’ve seen that when it was cold at the high-speed tracks like Silverstone and Spa, we were the quickest. Cold temperatures – good for us, high-speed – good for us, the low speed – we don’t like. Hot and traction is not great. When you hit it right, we can be very quick on a single lap. On a long run we’ll probably be third or fourth here,” Wolff said.
“The mood is up and down. We were quickest in some of the sessions, then suddenly you’re half a second behind like now, so it’s difficult to read. Lewis in particular said the car is good. We just need to analyse why we are missing time in Turns Seven and Eight compared to McLaren,” Wolff added.
Russell had a big crash during FP2, which meant the team had to make extensive repairs. They broke the curfew, and the boss warned that they were in “serious trouble” with the budget cap.
“We had a few big, big shunts in the garage over the last few races, and the mechanics have done an incredible job overnight. The chassis yesterday was damaged. We can repair it, but it’s not going to run here,” Wolff provided a final update on the situation with Russell’s car.
