Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff praised his team for standing by its principals and values during a difficult decision to adopt team tactics during the Hungarian Grand Prix.
The Brackley-based outfit was forced into action when Lewis Hamilton asked to be let through by team-mate Valtteri Bottas, in a bid to try and pass both Ferrari’s, who were running one-two mid-race.
Leader and championship rival Sebastian Vettel was suffering from a steering issue that affected the German’s pace, forcing him to stay away from the kerbs to prevent further damage.
Ferrari decided to not intervene with their drivers, with Vettel, potentially, being able to extend his championship lead going into the summer break.
Mercedes took a different route and told Bottas to move aside for Hamilton, who said he would let the Finn back through if he failed to pass by the end of the race.
Despite proving he had the pace to catch and pass the Ferrari’s, the dirty air meant the Briton couldn’t get close enough to attempt an overtake and, on the last lap, swapped positions with Bottas to gift him a podium finish.
With Hamilton sacrificing three points in his fight in the world championship, Wolff says they may regret the decision but believes it was the right thing to do.
“Saying that I wouldn’t regret the decision would be very naive,” he said. “The truth is that if you miss out the championship by those three points everybody would point the finger to Budapest.
“Then I would be the first one to shoot myself in the knee – and all of us! Nevertheless, in the long term standing by our principles and values will make us win more championships, that is what I believe.
“Yes, it was a tough call to make, and probably the most difficult that we had to make in the last five years, but it was the right one in terms of our values. We want to do it the right way. And that is sometimes very tough.”
Asked if he believed Ferrari’s pace was genuine, the Austrian replied: “I don’t think we saw their full race pace as Sebastian’s car was damaged – the steering wheel hanging to the left – and you could see that when Sebastian pitted and Kimi [Raikkonen] was in free air that he did very fast sector times.
“My guess is that if they had let him go he could have probably overtaken. But then you hear that Fernando Alonso did the fastest lap of the race. So my guess is that we have not seen the real Ferrari pace.”
