Mercedes' Toto Wolff impressed by 'encouraging' progress of RIVALS

British Grand Prix

Wolff impressed by 'encouraging' progress of RIVALS

Mercedes boss praises progress by midfield teams as McLaren break through the ranks

Lauren Sneath

Monday 10 July 2023 18:42

Toto Wolff has said the leaps and bounds made by Aston Martin and McLaren are ‘very encouraging’ and a ‘good example’ of how Mercedes could turn their season around.

Though Lewis Hamilton has been on three podiums for the team this year and George Russell one, Mercedes have been trying to push performance to compete with the dominant Red Bulls of Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez.

And yet it it their competitors Aston Martin and McLaren which have made the biggest gains in recent weeks.

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Aston, formerly stuck in the midfield, has had two-time world champion Fernando Alonso on the podium six times this season, thanks to a speedy car reminiscent in some ways of the Red Bull.

Fernando Alonso has been part of Aston Martin's resurgence

McLaren had a tough start to the season, but showed strong progress at the Austrian Grand Prix where Lando Norris finished in P4 with an upgraded car.

His team-mate Oscar Piastri did not have the upgrades then, but both drivers are running upgraded cars for the British Grand Prix.

Norris and Piastri took P2 and P3 in the qualifying session for the race, proving that McLaren’s alterations to the car are already paying off.

Wolff welcomes progress by other teams

Wolff was positive about the improvements seen in Aston Martin and McLaren camps.

As reported by Nextgen Fr, he said: "I think it's very encouraging to see that Aston Martin have gained big chunks of lap time between last year and this year.

“And in the same way, you see McLaren doing the same thing over the course of the season.

"That's something to be welcomed, if we see that consolidating, and it's certainly for us a good example of how you can turn things around. McLaren 'doing an Aston Martin' is a good example for Mercedes."

Regulations responsible for more even playing field

Wolff added that the regulations created in collaboration with the different teams ave played a part in midfield teams pushing ahead.

He said: "We were all actively involved in developing regulations that would, over time, allow the smaller teams to catch up and level the playing field.

"If you look at Albon, in terms of one-lap performance, he's right up there, and Aston is coming back as we've discussed before, as well as McLaren. That's what we wanted."

Toto Wolff praised the speed of Williams's driver Alex Albon

He added: "If you take Max out of the equation, having said that, he's four-tenths quicker than the top eight teams on a 90-second lap, so it's no longer huge, everyone else is within two-tenths.

“From second to seventh place, it's two tenths and that shows us that the regulations are working. It's bloody difficult and it's going to continue like this, but we knew that."

Mercedes qualifying ‘wasn’t good enough’

However, Wolff was less upbeat about Mercedes prospects over the weekend.

He suggested that while everything went according to plan, the team’s level is not as high as hoped.

Wolff explained of the qualifying result: "I think everything went according to plan. We had to find our reference points on Friday, which is why the stopwatch may not have been very good.

“But everything was solid and there's nothing we can say that didn't work as planned. It just wasn't good enough."