F1 News
Wolff sees where Mercedes are behind: 'Wished to fight the front three'
Mercedes and McLaren lead the constructors' championship hand in hand in this moment in team, as in Melbourne, both teams collected 27 points. That is however because both of their drivers scored good points, but George Russell was not close to Lando Norris and Max Verstappen ahead. Team principal Toto Wolff talked about where his team are currently behind their two rivals.
First, Wolff began to explain where his team lack compared to McLaren and Red Bull in this moment in time. "I think how they manage to turn around a non-performing car from the Friday to the Saturday is something which you always need to bear in mind and they hit the sweet spot there. So, I think when you look at the packing order in terms of tyre management, it's McLaren, and it's Red Bull and then it's us this weekend," the Austrian answered to GPblog among others.
While Russell finished on the podium, a victory was never on the cards for the British driver this afternoon. The Briton already had a considerable gap to the front three until the safety car and Oscar Piastri spun, and he had a quite uneventful race.
Wolff: 'McLaren reminiscent of our form in the 2010s'
Wolff explained he would have hoped for a better result, but the aforementioned issue could not be overcome today: "I think we would have wished to have a fight with the McLarens and with Verstappen under normal conditions. We have a deficit in keeping the tyres in the window. They are able to do that better and get faster. And with us we are seeing a degradation because they are simply getting too hot. That's why I would have liked to be a bit closer to them, but that's the reality."
"It's reminiscent to when, we had these years where we just wanted to disappear into the distance. But you must never give up, we've just done the first race weekend. We finished third and fifth. It would have been fourth and fifth on merit, but, we are where we are. And that's why you can never take your foot off the throttle," Wolff explained about how Mercedes look at making a decision in terms of when to start on their 2026 challenger.
He concluded: "We have to analyse what is it we can do in order to manage the tyre better. We're not missing 20 points in downforce. That's not the thing. It's just literally on the mechanical side, what can we do to keep these in the sweet spot. So, it hasn't changed anything in terms of how do we prioritise 2026 versus this year just after the first race week and you have to keep your cool and continue your trajectory."
This article was written in collaboration with Cas van de Kleut
Want more Formula 1? Then follow GPblog on our various social media channels!