“A slap in the face”. Toto Wolff did not mince words to comment on the qualifying performance at the end of Saturday at Paul Ricard. On the eve of the weekend the expectations, according to the Mercedes drivers themselves, were high profile, but the time trial said something else.
Lewis Hamilton fourth (but nine tenths from poleman Leclerc) and George Russell sixth, one second and two tenths. This was not the scenario they had foreseen in Mercedes, and in the end Wolff commented on a situation that was anything but rosy.
“The management of expectations this year has become a theme – he explained – we were slowly approaching the top positions, the Silverstone weekend in this respect was very encouraging, and also in Austria, a track usually difficult for us, we saw signs of recovery. We arrived here in France with a good package of updates, also comforted by a very smooth track, and instead the performance we expected did not arrive. And we don’t know what went wrong ”.
Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes W13, in the pit lane
Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images
The alarm went off on Friday, and yesterday morning in the FP3 session Hamilton tried a larger rear wing, which Lewis described as a parachute. The team subsequently switched to a smaller wing, but in the third sector a significant lack of downforce was immediately evident. The qualification reaffirmed the difficult moment, confirming once again the difficulties for the engineers to understand the W13 project.
“Honestly they arrived here this weekend hoping to be within three tenths of Red Bull and Ferrari – commented Hamilton – and instead we are a second”. “We have seen sessions in which we were not competitive in the first sector – confirmed Wolff – and then in the following round we were suddenly the fastest in the same section. Something abnormal is happening, it could be a problem influenced by the wind or by the tires that simply don’t work well on our car ”.
The problems that Mercedes is facing do not only impact on the stage spoils, but also on a longer-term future. Work on the 2023 single-seater has begun at the Brackley headquarters for a couple of months now, and the hope that feedback from the track could give indications on next year’s car has remained in vain for now.
George Russell, Mercedes W13
Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images
“The problem is that we don’t know what works and what doesn’t – confirmed Wolff – this is the most serious aspect of this situation. We may have great potential under our hood, but we can’t be sure. So it’s all a question mark right now. We came here to fight for victory, and we are further away than before. But let’s not give up, we’ll find out what happened and try again to aim for victory. This must be the goal, because we need to find the path that will also give us indications for next year ”. The bottles of champagne continue to travel from one race to another, but at the moment they remain strictly in the refrigerators.
The remaining hopes of being able to do better in today’s race are linked to the high temperatures. Already in other races, Mercedes has confirmed that it has less tire wear than Red Bull and Ferrari, but this too is a question mark.
No one has completed long-runs of more than ten laps between Friday and Saturday, so there are chances that some surprise might emerge. This is what both Hamilton and Russell counted on, that is a race that proves to be very tough with tire management, but after so many proclamations which were punctually followed by great disappointments, today in Mercedes no one has the desire and interest anymore to launch predictions .
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