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Wolff heavily displeased with Mercedes performance in Austrian GP

Wolff heavily upset with Mercedes performance: "Even worse than we thought"

2 July 2023 at 18:23
Last update 2 July 2023 at 18:32
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  • Kada Sarkozi
  • Editor

While Lewis Hamilton complained several times over the board radio during the Austrian Grand Prix about his car as well as the fact that he wanted to see more grid penalties for other drivers, Toto Wolff had had it with his star driver's lament at some point. The exchange was indicative of the difficult weekend Mercedes had at the Red Bull Ring.

Mercedes fell behind in the Austrian GP. " It was terribly difficult, actually worse than we thought," Wolff stated to the German branch of Sky Sports after the F1 race in Spielberg.

Wolff upset with Mercedes performance

"The car was just slow. Of course it doesn't help when you get penalties, but it wouldn't have made much difference. Maybe we could have stayed ahead of Fernando [Alonso]. We, and also the Aston Martins - although that doesn't make it any better - were just nowhere with our pace," the Mercedes team boss continued.

"Overall, it was a black day. Well, not a black day, we don't want to go that far. A bad day," Wolff summed up.

Lewis Hamilton finished seventh and collected a time penalty for exceeding track limits, an offence he seemed to attribute entirely to his hard-to-drive W14. George Russell crossed the finish line behind his teammate in eighth. Both drivers were well behind race winner Max Verstappen: they had to concede 39 and 48 seconds respectively to the Red Bull Racing driver.