Mercedes boss Toto Wolff has honestly shot down suggestions that Lewis Hamilton and George Russell could finally match the pace of Ferrari and Red Bull at Imola this weekend. The Austrian team principal has re-insisted that whilst Mercedes are ‘working hard’ to close the gap, they are unlikely to challenge for the race win in Sunday’s Emilia Romagna Grand Prix.
The Silver Arrows and their competitors have landed at Imola for the first European weekend of the 2022 F1 season, and there are plenty of performance upgrades expected on the grid. But it’s unclear whether there will be significant changes, considering this weekend hosts the first Sprint race of the year.
Teams will only be allowed one practice hour on Friday before the qualifying session to order the grid for Saturday’s Sprint race. And Mercedes aren’t expecting much change in their performance compared to Ferrari and Red Bull’s pace in the early stages of the season.
“We know we haven’t got the pace of the Ferrari and Red Bull right now,” Wolff explained. “But we’re working hard to reduce their advantage, and it’s been brilliant to see everyone across the factories pulling together to achieve this.”
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A ninth successive contructors’ championship is slipping away from Mercedes, with Ferrari and Charles Leclerc dominant so far this year. But Wolff has stressed the need to be ‘realistic’ about the time it will take for the Silver Arrows to return to title-fighting shape.
He added: “There’s been a lot of hard work over the Easter weekend in the factory to bring improvements to the car and get it ready to head to the next race, and that shows the team’s dedication to turning the situation around.
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