Mercedes Chief Promises "Radical" Changes For W14 After "Worst Day" In Bahrain GP
Mercedes F1 team principal Toto Wolff has reflected on what's next for Mercedes after a disappointing race in Bahrain for the team. The Grand Prix rewarded the Brackley squad with P5 and P7, and this isn't good enough for Wolff who demands "radical changes".
"One of the worst days in racing," Toto says solemnly. "Really not good at all.
"We're just lacking pace, front, right, and centre. And that's the reflection of the tests. The Aston Martin is very fast - they deserve that. And Red Bull is just on a different planet.
"That is what hurts," he admits. "Because they're so far ahead. It reminds me of our best years where, you know, we just put the second on everybody else. That is the benchmark.
"But we need to put one step after the other to just come back and we can do that."
He was asked further what their plan is now to gain pace:
"I think it's just radical," he said.
"They [Aston Martin], as I said deserve to be where they are because they did a fantastic job. The good news for us is there is a lot of Mercedes in there so we know exactly where to pinpoint it.
"And that will be helpful in the recovery."
He was further probed about driver Lewis Hamilton and his inspirational message to his team at the end of the race. Wolff, while admiring the leadership, admitted that he is "suffering":
"You must be a lot of suffering in there. Because the car is just so unstable.
"And you can see that on the steering wheel. But he is fantastic. He's been a massive performance contributor, not only in the car."
This is great news for Mercedes fans who are fed up with having poor performance from the W14 already. But we worry for one thing: the cost cap.
There's no way a radical change - as mentioned by Toto - can be afforded by a team who has already developed a sidepod upgrade for later in the year. This simply cannot be done, so while this sounds very optimistic, I realistically can't see Mercedes gaining real performance until next year.
The zero-pod concept simply has a performance ceiling, and it's going to cost a lot of cash to redesign the car from the ground up.