Toto Wolff described Max Verstappen as “in another galaxy” after the Dutchman won the season opener.
Verstappen picked up where he left off and comfortably won the opening round of the 2024 season, a result that is likely to be repeated throughout the year.
Toto Wolff talks about the 'mistake' behind Mercedes' problems
Additional reporting by Thomas Maher
Mercedes didn't have an easy night as both drivers had to deal with power unit problems, but after the race team principal Wolff was confused as to why they had lost so much time on the hard tyres. was.
“Max was in another galaxy,” Wolff told reporters, including Bahrain's PlanetF1.com. “We need to look at ourselves and see why we lost so much performance on hard tires.
“The cooling levels were wrong, so we had to lift and coast, which reduced the performance of the tires. It was a bit of a vicious cycle.”
Asked if the problem was specific to the circuit, Wolff said he was “learning” from the “many mistakes” they had made.
“I think it's strange because we didn't put the hard tires on today, even though the car had some pace,” Wolff said.
“I think there are a lot of mistakes we have made, but ultimately we are learning. We have a brand new car and we are seeing glimpses of performance, but today we are We couldn't do that either, so we'd like to look at the data and see what we can do.”
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Regarding the battle between George Russell and Charles Leclerc, Wolff said the ultimate loss was due to giving both drivers “uncompetitive” cars.
“There are some strange things,” he said. “He was really strong, but today he gave both of us cars that weren't competitive enough to race.
“I think we know some reasons why, but obviously they both struggled during the race. You can understand that.”
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