Toto Wolff says he is “excited to see the impact” of Mercedes’ impending Formula 1 upgrades but remains cautious over whether they will bolster the team’s performance.
Mercedes has endured a difficult start to the 2023 season with just one podium finish in the opening three races.
Like the rest of the grid, Mercedes has been left playing catch up to runaway leaders Red Bull at the start of the year and has decided to shift away from its ‘zero pod’ concept to try and close the deficit.
The German manufacturer will introduce its first major updates to the W14 at this weekend’s Azerbaijan Grand Prix that it hopes can put it on course to revive its season.
But while Mercedes heads to Baku off the back of an encouraging display in Australia last month, team boss Wolff is refusing to read too much into the result.
“We’ve had a few weeks off from racing but both factories have been hard at work,” Wolff said.
“We’ve tried to maximise this period, bringing planned development to the car and extracting as much as possible from our learnings so far.
“Australia showed that we are making progress, although we need to be cautious about reading too much into a single result. But the signs in Melbourne were still encouraging and that has been a good motivator for the whole team heading into this gap in the calendar.
“Over the next races, we want to keep on making small steps forward. The car will continue to evolve in the coming weeks, as we steadily bring performance and upgrades to the track. We’re excited to see their impact, but we know there is no magic bullet.”
Baku begins a busy period in the calendar following the four-week break since Melbourne that will see teams complete five races in six weeks.
“After just under a month with no F1 action, everyone’s eager to be back out on track,” Wolff said. “Thankfully we’ve got plenty of that coming up. It’s a busy window in the calendar with five races in six weekends, starting with Azerbaijan.
“The racing in Baku is always dramatic and entertaining. It’s a challenging track with the walls close, so there’s no room for error.”
The Baku City circuit will also host the first sprint race of the season that has undergone a shake-up to the format with a new ‘sprint shootout’ qualifying session to be run on Saturday morning instead of second practice.
This now means the sprint becomes a standalone event without any impact of Sunday’s grand prix and Wolff is anticipating it to be an “interesting challenge”.
“We also have our first F1 Sprint weekend of the season with a tweaked format,” he added.
“It’s an interesting challenge for us to tackle, with only a single practice session to be ready for two qualifying sessions and races spread across Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Hopefully this will mean more excitement and action for fans to enjoy.”
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