Toto Wolff says he doesn’t want to move the goalposts because Mercedes has to get better, meet their own expectations and beat Red Bull by their rules.
At the Belgian Grand Prix, the Silver Arrows experienced the most difficult moments in the new era of Formula 1. In qualifying, Mercedes had one of the worst performances in the season so far.
During the race, the W13 car of the German team looked a little better, but they benefited from numerous penalties that the drivers received after changing the components of the power unit.
Mercedes boss Toto Wolff is clearly the mindset of his team as they try to tackle their challenges.
“Today we get it wrong. Incorrect correlation in different areas causes our failures. Now maybe there is one single thing that overshadows everything and therefore it is not fair to examine every part of the car,” says the Austrian.
“Are the tires, something that we fundamentally do not understand, but in fact everything else is fine? Does the aero or mechanical balance spoil it? It’s so hard. As we say, you never lose – you learn, and I can tell you that it’s very hard.”
“All these beautiful posts on Instagram and everything we’ve been talking about. How are we going to take this? When you get there in the dungeon, you stick to your principles, your values, you keep your spirit and you really keep relentlessly seeking to get better. This year there is more to write a book about than the last eight years,” he points out.
One of the hopes for Mercedes was that the FIA’s anti-bounce technical directive, which also bans the flexible floors suspected to be used by Red Bull and Ferrari, would help close the gap on the top teams.
However, things at last race at the Belgian Grand Prix did nothing to help Mercedes close the gap on Red Bull and Ferrari. However, the boss of the German team wants to beat Red Bull with their rules.
“All credit to Max, how he does things, and to Red Bull. Rules are rules. I don’t want the goalposts to move. We simply need to get better, meet our own expectations and beat them by their rules,” Wolff concluded.
