Toto Wolff has highlighted the challenge Mercedes faces as they enter the winter and try to reclaim the ground needed to reach the current world champions Red Bull, characterizing their chances as being “against the odds.”
Mercedes has performed poorly thus far in Formula One’s most recent ground effect era, despite winning seven world titles and eight consecutive constructors’ crowns between 2014 and 2021.
Red Bull, who won 21 of the 22 races held in 2023 and easily won both World Championships in 2022, followed in their dominating footsteps. Mercedes, on the other hand, did not win for the first time since 2011.
After a thrilling battle with Ferrari to secure the runner-up position in the constructors’ standings, Mercedes team manager Frank Wolff expressed conflicting feelings during the season finale in Abu Dhabi last weekend.
Wolff remarked, “You know, when you win P2, it reminds you that you lost P1.” We should, in my opinion, accept it, exercise humility, and look on today as a positive one. Still, there’s Mount Everest to scale before you can catch up to Red Bull.
“I have no doubt that McLaren is going to be right in the mix next year, maybe Aston Martin, maybe others, and we must leave no stone unturned [at Mercedes’ factories] in Brixworth and in Brackley.
