Why Mercedes left Hamilton during the VSC



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20:53 – According to Mercedes boss Toto Wolff, his team wavered on two thoughts during the virtual safety car phase of the fifteenth round of the Austrian Grand Prix, after the Failure of Valtteri Bottas. Mercedes chose not to appeal to Lewis Hamilton, but it cost him his head.

With Hamilton on P1 and Bottas on P2, Mercedes seemed to have the race on the Red Bull Ring, but on the fifteenth round changed everything. Bottas fell and caused a phase of virtual security car. That's why Max Verstappen, Kimi Raikkonen, Daniel Ricciardo and Sebastian Vettel stopped at the booth, where Mercedes Hamilton was out.

Hamilton stopped only ten laps later, while everyone was driving at full speed. . As a result, the reigning world champion lost a lot of time compared to the Red Bulls and Ferrari, who lost relatively little time with their tire changes at the VSC. During a virtual neutralization, the speed should be reduced on the track, Hamilton could then save less time. As a result, Verstappen came in first and after refueling, Hamilton fell back to P4.

"Thinking too long"

"We drove first and second and checked the race, but suddenly you see your second stop, Wolff starts his analysis." There was a VSC and we had a half turn to answer, but we did not do it, it is here that we lost the race, there is a VSC at this stage of the race, then a pit stop probably for eighty percent, definitely what you have to do. "

Where Ferrari and Red Bull still had both drivers in the race, Hamilton was the only remaining Mercedes driver, which made his team doubt, according to Wolff." What we thought was: "What would happen to me? They would come with one car [Red Bull en Ferrari]? "Then we would come back on the road behind Kimi, as they would leave him behind and behind Max Qu? Would that mean? Before the race, I do not mean that this whole line of thought has distracted us, but we have been working on it for far too long. "

Hamilton would return to P5 later in the race, because he had to add a supplement to his pitstop softs.It had already happened to Ricciardo.Wolff:" Only the Ferrari's have Had no problem with the tires, but the others suffered many blisters and this was certainly not what we expected, I think it was ten degrees Celsius hotter than expected. because the drivers in question were attacking, we went full and that means that you overheat the tread of the tire, which leads to blisters again. "

" My most painful day at Mercedes "

due to a technical problem not coming to the finish." It's the most painful day of my life at Mercedes, worse than Barcelona, ​​"remembers the Austrian two years ago when he saw his drivers Hamilton and Nico Rosberg meet in Barcelona in the first round." Before the start [in Oostenrijk] a lot of people have come to tell me that it would be a child's play, a two, because we would have the fastest car, but that's exactly how it happens in motor sport. This can be incredibly cruel and in this race it was absolutely the case for us. "

Mercedes introduced an improved power unit last week in France, but the failure of Hamilton and Bottas has nothing to do with that." At Valtteri, we had a hydraulic problem and Lewis has lost the fuel pressure, which may be related to the fuel system, which is our current information, "says Wolff." So we do not regret the introduction of our new engine. "

With the cooperation of Adam Cooper and Edd Straw

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