A Mercedes 2024 is experiencing its worst start to the season in Formula 1 in more than a decade, with just 26 points achieved in the first three races and fifth place in the Constructors’ World Championship, crowned by a double retirement in the previous stage, the Australian GP. And that took the boss Toto Wolff to change your plans for this weekend.
Since the beginning of the category’s current era of regulations, introduced in 2022, Mercedes has experienced a drop in performance compared to the victorious phase from 2014 to 2021, when it won eight consecutive Constructors’ World Championships.
The risky bet on the zeropod concept made Mercedes complicated in its search for a return to winning ways. Even so, the German team managed to maintain a certain level in 2022 and 2023, taking third and second place in the Constructors’ World Championship, respectively.
For 2024, Mercedes took even more risks, changing the car’s philosophy and seeking to reverse important problems from previous models, such as an unstable rear end and a very forward positioning of the cockpit, something particularly criticized by Lewis Hamilton.
And, even with the praise from the seven-time champion and George Russell At the beginning of the year, the results did not come, giving Mercedes a start to the season to forget, having won fewer points than in previous years.
With Mercedes looking for ways to reverse its poor start to the season, where it is in fifth place in the World Championship after three rounds, Wolff has decided that this is not the time to stay away during a race weekend.
Even before the start of the season, Wolff and Mercedes had designed a schedule that would free the boss from being present at all 24 GPs, so that he could also focus on his other functions within the German team and the manufacturer. The Japanese GP would be the first on this list, but the team’s momentum forced him to go back.
The information was confirmed by Mercedes to Sky Sports F1. With this, Wolff will no longer command the weekend remotely, from his home in Monaco, and will be present in the Suzuka paddock for the first time since 2022, as, last year, he also did not attend the Japanese GP.
