Mercedes did not have the best of starts to their race weekend in Brazil. Even though George Russell started the sprint race brilliantly by gaining two positions, he lost the places immediately to Lando Norris and Sergio Perez. Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff has now blamed the W14 for the same.
Talking about this, the Mercedes boss said as per Junaid Samodien on X, “We pushed very hard at the start. The car wasn’t balanced correctly and we kept sliding around. It was similar to what happened to George in Mexico. Everything went against us today, we need to scratch our heads hard to see what we can do better.”
Furthermore, Lewis Hamilton also faced a similar situation when he failed to keep Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc and AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda at bay. Since Ferrari and the Silver Arrows have a similar pace, Tsunoda’s overtake of Hamilton was nothing short of surprising.
Now, with Ferrari gaining some points over Mercedes, the Silver Arrows will need to ensure that they do not lose too much ground in the main race on Sunday.
How can Ferrari pose a threat to Mercedes on Sunday?
Lewis Hamilton and George Russell are sure to face immense pressure from the likes of McLaren and Ferrari when the lights go out on Sunday. Mercedes starts the race from P5 and P6 and there are risks of losing position to multiple teams.
Behind Hamilton and Russell, Lando Norris, Carlos Sainz and Sergio Perez start their race. Given how strong McLaren and Red Bull are, the Silver Arrows will face a huge task to keep the likes of Norris and Perez behind.
In such a scenario, Mercedes’ sole aim would be to grab as many points as possible to ensure that they do not lose too much ground to Ferrari. As things stand, the Silver Arrows have scored 378 points so far and are 24 points clear of third-placed Ferrari.
