Wolff reveals mechanical issue that compromised Mercedes' performance on Friday
Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff insists that his team figured out what compromised the W15's performance on the opening day of the Belgian Grand Prix which was crucial for the team to take its first one-two finish since the 2022 Brazilian Grand Prix.
Mercedes endured a difficult opening day at the Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps. The Anglo-German outfit struggled for one-lap pace, but their race simulation was not great either.
The team also switched its initial low-downforce configuration to a higher-downforce package between the first and second practice, but it still yielded little progress. However, Mercedes elected to ditch its heavily-upgraded floor to revert to its old-specification while they also made further crucial tweaks to the W15's aerodynamic configuration.
With qualifying day heavily affected by rain and damp conditions, Mercedes were unable to assess the effect of the modification. But the team showed excellent pace and went for a brilliant strategy with George Russell to secure a double victory for the first time since the 2022 Brazilian Grand Prix.
Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff has revealed that trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin detected a mechanical issue on the W15 that held its real performance back on Friday.
"We were nowhere - we changed a few things on the car and today we were clearly ahead of everyone. We didn't think it was possible [to one-stop] but we were going to finish fifth in both scenarios so said let's stay out..."
"We were expecting at best a podium - but the car worked well on one-stop and two-stops. Overnight Friday to Saturday, Shov [Andrew Shovlin] our Chief Engineer said 'I've figured out what it is'. I don't think the new floor was bad, what we realised overnight was we tripped over on a mechanical issue.
Wolff defended his team's decision to pit Hamilton early on for a new set of hards, claiming that Mercedes wanted to fend off the undercut attempts of Charles Leclerc.
"I'd like to have two winners today, but we had to cover Leclerc and [Piastri] or we would have been undercut. George was P5, the one-stop showed P5 so we went for it. I think he was very good today, but then when you look at the pace Lewis was very good. The strategy played for George not Lewis, like I said I'd like to have two winners today," claimed Wolff.
