Mercedes “lost their way” as concern expressed over W15 development
"You’d hope that your Mexico car would be quicker than your Silverstone car. It wasn’t."
Mercedes’ P4 and P5 in Mexico was “not positive”, insists Martin Brundle.
Lewis Hamilton and George Russell fought through niggling issues to record solid finishing positions at the F1 Mexico City Grand Prix, both ahead of Red Bull’s Max Verstappen.
But the round belonged to Ferrari who overtook Red Bull into second in the constructors’ championship, as Carlos Sainz brilliantly won the race. Charles Leclerc completed the podium.
Sky Sports’ Brundle said about Mercedes: “I don’t think it’s been a particularly good day, if I’m honest.
“44 is Lewis’ favourite number that’s also the amount of seconds behind the winner that he was. George was 48 seconds behind.
“That’s a long way. You can go a very long way in 48 seconds in a Formula 1 car.
“This is a car that has won the British Grand Prix and the Belgian Grand Prix.
“They have stalled out a bit, lost their way in the updates.
“George was losing two tenths? You’d hope that your Mexico car would be quicker than your Silverstone car. It wasn’t.
“Lewis said ‘we will get this together’ but I can’t see this being a positive day for Mercedes.”
Hamilton blamed understeer for a bad first stint which he was forced to overcome.
Russell was running an earlier spec of the W15 after doing damage in a crash in practice. He also crashed a week earlier in Texas.
While Mercedes have their problems to fix before this weekend’s Sao Paulo Grand Prix, it was Hamilton’s future team Ferrari who stole the show.
Danica Patrick said about Hamilton: “Has anyone asked him ‘hey have you seen how well Ferrari are doing? Are you excited?’
“But fourth and fifth is good. It’s a big gap from first, of course.
“I spotted at the beginning of the race that Mercedes would have a good day.
“They had good results, in terms of their finishing position, because it was much cooler.
“When the temperature goes up, they have a decline in performance.
“It was much cooler which gave them an opportunity to capitalise, and a window to perform.
“But they have not progressed like other teams have, especially Ferrari.”
James was a sports journalist at Sky Sports for a decade covering everything from American sports, to football, to F1.
