Wolff believes Mercedes are now ‘clearly back’ – and pinpoints moment that led to breakthrough

Toto Wolff has expressed his satisfaction at the progress made by Mercedes this season, following on from a pair of morale-boosting wins for George Russell and Lewis Hamilton in Austria and at Silverstone.

The team began the 2024 season aiming to right the wrongs of their challenging 2022 and 2023 campaigns, only to once again find themselves significantly behind Red Bull – who have aced F1’s current ground effect era so far – when the action got under way.

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However, a series of encouraging updates, particularly from the Monaco Grand Prix onwards, have propelled the Silver Arrows into contention, bringing their first pole position, podium finishes and most recently victories of the year.

At the Red Bull Ring, George Russell took advantage of a late clash involving Max Verstappen and Lando Norris to snatch the win, while at Silverstone, the Mercedes pair locked out the front row of the grid before Hamilton triumphed in changeable weather conditions.

It means that from the last four race weekends, Mercedes have two poles, four podiums and two wins to their name, giving Wolff and the rest of the team plenty of optimism as the season enters its second half.

“You could see that five races ago we weren’t even contenders for the podium, which looked like the third year of non-performance, and then it clicked,” said Wolff, with Mercedes having won just one other race since the start of the 2022 season.

“Suddenly everything that didn’t make sense, made sense, and the results of the development direction is like in the old days. We are finding performance, we are putting it on the car, and it translates into lap time. That wasn’t the case for the last two years.”

While Wolff added Mercedes “mustn’t get carried away” with their recent form, he agreed with the notion that the team are now “clearly back” in the mix.

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“Yeah, it does feel that way, because [in Austria] we weren’t far off,” he said. “If you you look at the gap we had before [Verstappen and Norris] crashed, it was nearly two-tenths a lap, a bit more.

“That’s the closest we’ve been for a long time on a track that we didn’t like so much in the past. That kind of gave us hints that it could be getting much better.

“Honestly, we didn’t think it would be Silverstone, because more stuff we were putting on the car, we were more expecting Budapest or Spa, but we justified that what we do is right at the moment.”

Following on from his “then it clicked” comment, Wolff pinpointed the moment he feels Mercedes made a breakthrough with their development direction after almost two-and-a-half seasons of relative struggles.

It came in the wake of the experienced James Allison returning to the role of Technical Director midway through last season, having swapped places with Mike Elliott, who has since vacated his position as Chief Technical Officer.

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“There was a moment where, led by James, suddenly the data made sense – and the gap,” Wolff added of the head-scratching that has been going on at Mercedes’s factory in recent months.

“Mainly the way we balance the car and how we could bring it in a better sweet spot. I think that was the main thing. It wasn’t a miracle front wing [introduced in Monaco], it is more the balance that we achieved.”

Mercedes hold fourth in the constructors’ standings at the midway point of the campaign on 221 points, with McLaren in third on 295, Ferrari in second on 302 and leaders Red Bull on 373.