Toto Wolff at F1 British Grand Prix: Mercedes tried the Red Bull concept in wind tunnel - but it didn’t work
Red Bull’s Max Verstappen continued to dominate in qualifying at the F1 British Grand Prix but McLaren significantly made huge strides after introducing⛎ their own upgrade package.
“It’s a wake-up call for us,” said Lewis Hamilton, who qualified in sꦡeventh, about McLღaren, whose driver Lando Norris is on the front row.
“If you just put it alongside a Red Bull, it looks very very similar ꦡdo𝔍wn the side, so it’s working,” Hamilton noted.
Wolff reacted: “I think from what you see from the outside, which is only half of the information, is that t🍌he car looks like a Red Bull.
“As a matter of fact, to be honest, it doesn’t matter, beꩲcause only the stopwatch counts.
“This is what I guess Lewis was referring to, bec♔ause this design seems to be a good direction.
“But it is easier said than done and each of us ha♐d bodywork that looked like the Red Bull in the [wind] tunnel and it didn’t come in up🃏 in performance.
“So you have got to leave no stone unturned and maybe do it again because another team🔯 has just found a second in performance.”
Mercedes trusted their radical 'zeropod' concept at the start of this season but have sinced moved away from it, closer to the direction𒐪 which Red Bull have found joy with, and whicဣh McLaren are replicating.
Wolff insisted that thꦍe newfound pecking order on the Silverstone starting grid is proof that the current regulations are working.
“It’s exactly that, and I think we have a💧ll been part of and active in designing regulations that would allow over time smaller teams to catch up and level the playing field,” he said.
“If you look at Alex Albon on a single lap, their performance is right there and with Aston coming back, a💟nd McLaren, it’s what we wanted.
“If you take now Max out of the equation, having said that he is 0.4s quicker than the top eight drivers on a 90-second lap,𒈔 so that is not h🥀uge chunks any more everybody else is within 0.2s.
“From P2 to P9🥀 is 0.2s, so it shows us that the regulations work. Coming back to us, that is then tough, but we knew that.”
James was a spo༺rts journalist at Sky Sports for a decade covering everything from Amer🍰ican sports, to football, to F1.
