Wolff admits Mercedes got F1 strategy wrong: “We didn’t time it right”

Verstappen stormed to a memorable home victory at Zandvoort ahead of Mercedes duo Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas.

Red Bull covered off Mercedes’ two undercut attempts to ensure Verstappen retained track position over Hamilton.

Mercedes tried to use Bottas strategically to hold Verstappen up but it wasn’t enough as he breezed past after just two laps behind the Finn on Lap 31.

Mercedes was criticised for bringing Hamilton in for a second time on Lap 40 for mediums, dropping him into traffic, while Verstappen switched to the hards a lap later.

Reflecting on it after the race, team boss Wolff conceded that Mercedes could have done better.

“We didn’t time it right,” Wolff told Sky Sports. “At the end, you’re always more clever. We didn’t expect them to go on the hard tyres as it was an unknown. We didn’t drive the hard tyre on the Friday and we thought we might be pushing them early with the soft, but it is what it is.

“I think the hard tyre was a bit of a gamble because you could have seen that on the Ferrari that it was going well but it was unknown territory as none of us had really run it - we didn’t run it at least.”

Due to Verstappen’s superior pace, Wolff felt that Mercedes had to take risks with its undercut attempts.

“In terms of the strategy we must say that probably 50% of the race was probably lost in qualifying and the start,” he added. “And they just had tremendous pace. I think if we would have been ahead, emphasis on would have been, I think we would have had the pace to but it was important to take some risks also. We didn’t think they would take the hard.

“That was a bit of an uncharted territory and our thought was to push them into an early second stop on softs that could have given us a chance at the end. That’s why we weren’t particularly bothered about where we would come out. They took the hard, they risked a bit and they won the race.”