Verstappen Is Only Driver Who Understood Crucial Aspect Of F1 Cars In 2023 Says Wolff

Wednesday, 29 November 2023 at 04:00

Updated at Wednesday, 29 November 2023 at 11:00

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff shared his observation concerning oscillations in the performance of the top drivers on the F1 grid.

The phrase "oscillations in performance" is what we could use to define the 2023 season for the Mercedes team. It rarely happened. Silver arrows seemed to perform well on some circuits and then had a shocking performance on others.

What was even stranger for Mercedes is that often only one driver would have a good race while the other one struggled. Toto Wolff said:

“"It is just difficult to comprehend that good drivers in various teams have these oscillations in performance."”

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The Mercedes team principal pointed out that Mercedes is not the only team struggling with this problem. Carlos Sainz from Ferrari, for example, is the only driver not from Red Bull who has won a race this season but has struggled very much in Abu Dhabi.

“"You've seen it this weekend with [Carlos] Sainz and [Charles] Leclerc, you've seen it with George and Lewis and Oscar [Piastri] and Lando [Norris], and the obvious one is [Sergio] Perez and [Max] Verstappen."”

Perez has been able to match Verstappen at the beginning of the season but then fell back more than a second behind on some occasions and started closing the gap back down towards the end of the season.

“"Perez is not a second slower than Max, so what [is causing it?]. We have seen it swinging in both directions, and fundamentally, I think all around it is the tire grip."”

The Mercedes team principal identified the main reason behind everything, is how drivers work with their tires. Lando Norris compared to George Russell in Mexico City has been a good example. Wolff explained:

“"If you are able to kind of have it in a sweet spot, a stable flat platform that you start to work with at the beginning of the weekend, then you can extract performance."”

The most consistent driver in the 2023 season has been Max Verstappen with his 19 victories and Wolff suggests it is because he was the only one who understood how to drive the tires.

“"If you are not there, there's just no performance, you're falling off the cliff, literally. I have no explanation for it, and the only one this year who understood how to drive these tyres is Max."”