Toto Wolff says Red Bull Racing were on ‘another level’ compared to the Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team during the Mexico City Grand Prix, with Lewis Hamilton able to only finish second behind title rival Max Verstappen.
Hamilton and team-mate Valtteri Bottas filled the front row at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez, but both fell behind Verstappen heading into turn one, and Wolff feels that even if Hamilton was in the lead, the Dutchman would still have found a way to get ahead of the reigning World Champion.
“First, we must congratulate Red Bull because their pace was on another level,” said Wolff, the Team Principal at Mercedes. “I don’t think we could have won the race even if we had stayed ahead in the first corner because they could have pincered us around the pit stops.
“At the end, I think for Lewis’ championship it was damage limitation and he drive a brilliant race with the equipment he was given.”
Mercedes’ race was further compromised at turn one on lap one as Bottas was spun around by McLaren F1 Team’s Daniel Ricciardo, with the Finn re-joining at the back of the field as a result of the contact.
From there on in it was impossible for him to make much progress, and in the end, it was just a case of pitting for fresh soft tyres to deny Verstappen the bonus point for fastest lap.
“As for the Constructors’, Valtteri spinning out at turn 1 was just very painful,” admitted Wolff. “Looking at the start, we had two cars in front but it seemed to open up for Max to come around the outside – then the spin for Valtteri cost us the points that we could have had for a third or fourth place finish.”
Wolff says Mercedes will be doing everything they can to fight back next weekend in Brazil, although the Autódromo José Carlos Pace has traditionally been a strong track for Red Bull in recent visits.
“Looking ahead to Brazil, this has also traditionally been a Red Bull track – but we’re going to pick ourselves up and give it everything to fight back, then we have three more to go after that,” he said.
