“You need to take this one on the chin”– Mercedes boss Toto Wolff on what should be his team mindset after defeat in Belgian GP in ‘farcical way’

Tanish Chachra | 30/08/2021
"You need to take this one on the chin"– Mercedes boss Toto Wolff on what should be his team mindset after defeat in Belgian GP in 'farcical way'

“You need to take this one on the chin”– Mercedes boss Toto Wolff speaks on his team’s approach after a disappointing end to the Belgian GP.

The end of the Belgian Grand Prix was highly questionable, but in the end, the results now can’t be reversed, as Max Verstappen’s half-point win brings him only three points away from Lewis Hamilton in the championship.

Not delighted with the result, Mercedes has expressed its qualms about FIA’s approach but also claimed it would not be further pressing on the matter and will take the result on the chin.

“Half points have been awarded, when probably it was expected that the weather wouldn’t get any better,” Wolff said. “But it is what it is. And I guess you need to take this one on the chin and close the chapter for this race and move on.”

“In a certain way, we must really applaud the fans that have been there for three days in the rain, they have waited for a race to happen. But as a team, we lost some points and that’s why we have to move on.”

Can’t control the weather, and Monday was out of the question

During the regular postponement of the race start, there were multiple suggestions of keeping the race on Monday, like IndyCar and NASCAR allows for a race to be postponed until Monday, but it was denied, and Wolff defends that decision.

“Everybody tried hard to get a race under way and because of the rain, it didn’t happen,” Wolff said. “To maybe come back to your Monday question, I think we have had plenty of fans that day that will have to go back to their jobs tomorrow.”

“We would have tried to have the race for the local fans, and therefore that wouldn’t have made a great difference for them.”

Post Edited By: Tanish Chachra
Mercedes Toto Wolff

About the author

Tanish Chachra

Tanish Chachra is the Motorsport editor at The SportsRush. He saw his first race when F1 visited India in 2011, and since then, his romance with the sport has been seasonal until he took up this role in 2020. Reigniting F1's coverage on this site, Tanish has fallen in love with the sport all over again. He loves Kimi Raikkonen and sees a future world champion in Oscar Piastri. Away from us, he loves to snuggle inside his books.

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