Images courtesy of Mercedes AMG Petronas
Mercedes’ Executive Director, Toto Wolff, expected tougher competition from rivals Ferrari in the Austrian Grand Prix, but admits he is worried about a resurgence from the Scuderia.
Speaking to motorsport.com, the Austrian said: “We see their performance during sessions; we saw their long runs on Friday and on Saturday morning when their pace was better than ours. And this disappeared in qualifying.”
Kimi Raikkonen’s long run prime stint averaged 0.2 seconds per lap faster and for longer than Nico Rosberg’s on the prime tyre in FP2. Vettel also topped the timesheets in FP3.
“I can see parallels with 2013 when we also had sessions like this or races where we showed good performance, but just couldn’t maintain this.”
Concerned about the development of the Ferrari, Wolff adds: “We can’t afford ourselves to be complacent and neglectful, because if you are there is a big chance you don’t develop your car and your team so [you] can’t follow this winning way,”.
