Mercedes F1 got off to a great start to its weekend in Las Vegas, with two best times during Freestyles 1 and 2.
Enough to make Toto Wolff, the director, smile again? But we've seen Mercedes F1 do this before on Friday and then suddenly lose ground on Saturday and Sunday. Does it feel different this weekend?
“I think we are the champions of the dirty tracks. The Free 1s are always great, then as soon as the grip starts to feel good, we saw the performance deteriorate. That said, I think the gap was Quite important. It's the biggest we've seen so far in Free 1, and we stayed ahead in Free 2, just a little bit.”
“So we'll have to do our homework for all the sessions tomorrow, in qualifying. I really hope that we don't fall behind the others again like we did in the past on some tracks, but that we remain competitive and We will fight at the forefront.”
George Russell told the media day that Mercedes F1 now understands the car's problems. Is this a first sign of this progress?
“Yes, but before the summer we also understood and it was clear that this was the path we had to take. And then we put updates on the car and again it seems like we are taking the wrong direction and it's very difficult to get out of it again and we're not the only team that has had this problem. But on the other hand you can't go back to an upgrade from Silverstone and the. install on the car and hope to be in front, because since then, everyone improved by a few tenths So, yes, the more you ride, the more you fail, the more you learn. But the competition doesn't sleep.
At the same time, Mercedes F1 has made 2026 its priority. While waiting to have the rule book for single-seaters on January 1st, work continues in full swing on the new 50% thermal / 50% electric engine. Does the development meet its expectations?
“Some expectations are met, that's good. For others, we continue to fight to achieve our goals. This is not trivial. But then the question is whether you have set your expectations in the right way So the answer is that we don't know where we stand compared to our competitors, but it's the same for everyone.”
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