Before the Formula 1 race in Monza, Mercedes is struggling with a top speed that is too low, which could make Alexander Albon’s Williams an insurmountable hurdle for Lewis Hamilton.
Actually, Mercedes had not expected a good qualifying result for the Formula 1 race in Monza. Because the low downforce course does not meet the strengths of the W14.
“If you look at the top speeds: I looked at the lists and we were at the bottom almost everywhere,” says Motorsport Director Toto Wolff, naming the Silver Arrows’ big problem.
That was already shown in Spa and Baku, but with fourth and eighth place in qualifying, at least part of the expectations were exceeded, also compared to last year: “We were 1.2 seconds behind last year and know that we low downforce wouldn’t lie,” says Wolff.
“Now the car should be faster everywhere, but given the difficult tracks and the gap between our faster car and the front, we have every reason to be semi-satisfied,” said the Austrian. Because this time the gap to pole was “only” 0.377 seconds.
Mercedes star Hamilton complains: “There’s nothing easy about this car!”
And at least one pilot could live well with his result today. While Russell was very happy with fourth place, Hamilton was not at all with eighth place. However, the Briton was only one and a half tenths of a second behind his team-mate’s fourth place, so he had to struggle with his lap.
“I lost it all in the second and last sector,” he says angrily. In fact, he was just under a tenth of a second ahead of his team-mate after the first sector.
He still had a small lead over them after the second sector, but at 26.812s he ran a poor last sector (Russell 26.623) and lost ground.
“I just had problems with the car,” he explains. “It wasn’t great. The car felt the best in the first practice session and after that it got worse.” Hamilton continued: “Our car is generally very difficult to optimize, there is nothing easy about this car.”
Russell also says that Mercedes knows the W14’s strengths lie more on high-downforce circuits, rather than circuits like Spa or Monza. “That’s why we expected to have a few problems here. And that we ended up fourth, I’m very happy with that.”
Mercedes driver Russell has overcome the low
A good trend continued for Russell himself: Already in Zandvoort he had come out of a little low phase with starting position three, where he had lost six of seven qualifying sessions against teammate Hamilton before the summer break. That seems to have been overcome now.
“It’s kind of a return to basics, a really good reset,” he says. “With my personal performance in the first two races [nach der Sommerpause] i am very satisfied. I’m back at the level of the first six races.”
“Before the break I lost track a bit. That’s why I’m really happy with fourth place,” said the Briton. But what were the reasons for the low?
“I think the tires are a big factor and that you should go back to basics a bit. And like I said, don’t try to reinvent the wheel, just accept the speed of the car,” said Russell .
That means: “Fourth place today was the maximum potential. But if I had aimed for pole and tried to find three extra tenths, I would have ended up in the gravel trap because three tenths more is just not possible. We know how important it is The tire is. This is the best example: in Q1 we were 13th, in Q3 we were fourth – and the only thing that changed was the tyres.”
Mercedes team boss Wolff: More training will help us
Wolff knows that the car often has its own peculiarities and that it takes some time to set it up correctly because it reacts quite sensitively.
“You don’t know what the car is going to do when you turn in, so it’s all about building confidence in the sessions,” he says. “And the longer we drive, the better we get and the better the fine-tuning – that helps.”
“But sprint races are not great for us because the car is such a diva.”
But Monza is not a sprint race and Mercedes did its homework properly. The question is what’s in it for the Silver Arrows on Sunday. According to Wolff, Mercedes was the third force behind a “spectacular” Ferrari long run and Max Verstappen. “If we can take on the guys up front then that would be good,” he says.
But there would also be the problem with the lack of top speed on the straights, which can be quite a hindrance on Sunday, especially for Lewis Hamilton, who actually wants to move up from eighth place.
Mercedes in front of insurmountable Williams wall?
“We’re just too slow on the straights,” says Wolff. “Our car has too much drag for this type of high-speed track.”
That was still enough for a good lap time in qualifying, but when it comes to overtaking, that becomes a potential stumbling block.
In addition, the DRS effect will be quite small due to the already narrow rear wings. “You’re only gaining a tenth or two,” says Russell, wanting to try and get past Ferrari in the pit stops.
“I expect we’ll have better tire degradation, so our only chance is to be quicker at the pit stops and do something different than them.”
Hamilton tends to focus on other opponents. Above all, Alexander Albon’s Williams, who will start two positions ahead of Hamilton, could become a wall for the Brit: “Williams will be almost impossible to overtake. He’s the fastest on the straights,” he says. “But I’ll try to come forward somehow tomorrow. Where there’s a will, there’s a way.”