29/05/2024
NEWS STORY
Mercedes boss, Toto Wolff has denied that his team is favouring George Russell over Lewis Hamilton ahead of the seven-time champion's impending move to Maranello.
Over the course of the Monaco weekend there were two incidents that caused observers to wonder whether Hamilton is already being 'shut out', the first being the revelation that a new front wing was only made available to his teammate and the second being the failure to give him vital information during the race.
As the leading four pulled away, Hamilton was running behind in the DRS train headed by his Mercedes teammate. Hamilton was already miffed as he had wanted to start the original race on mediums but the team opted for hards. Consequently when the race was red-flagged and restarted, Mercedes opted to put the seven-time world champion on the yellow-banded rubber.
As the afternoon played out, it was clear that strategy was the key, and while the McLarens were never able to take advantage in the leading group, Hamilton saw the opportunity to undercut Max Verstappen who was running behind Russell.
Hamilton pitted on Lap 51, however the team failed to tell him to push in order to get the jump on the Dutchman. Consequently, when the Red Bull driver pitted a lap later he emerged still ahead of the Mercedes.
"Why didn't you tell me out-lap was critical?" asked Hamilton.
"That was a miscommunication first between us on the pit-wall that we got that wrong," Wolff subsequently told GP Racing. "It should have been an 'out-lap critical', trying to undercut.
"But then there was a debate whether any out-lap would be enough from the new tyre and so the message he got was at best confusing but probably wrong," he added. "It should have been an 'out-lap critical' and the worry in the background was that if we thrashed that tyre in a single lap then what would happen later?. But in summary: wrong message to Lewis, this was the team's fault."
However, with a sizeable lead over Yuki Tsunoda, who was running some distance behind in eighth, why didn't the team pit Hamilton earlier?
"We wanted to be close to Verstappen and then do the undercut," said Wolff. "Which obviously we got the messaging completely wrong."
All well and good, but in a further twist, it was revealed on Saturday that new front wing had only been made available to Russell, even though Hamilton had been running in the top three of all three practice sessions.
Indeed, ahead of Saturday's all-important qualifying session Hamilton admitted that he would be on the back foot.
"I already know automatically that I'm going to lose two-tenths going into qualifying," he told Sky Sports. "I don't anticipate being ahead of George in qualifying, particularly this term."
When asked to explain, he simply said: "We'll see."
"Aren't all drivers a bit sceptical at times?" said Wolff, when asked about Hamilton's cryptic comment. "I think as a team, we've demonstrated even in the most tense competitions between team-mates that we are trying to always balance the drive and be transparent and fair.
"I think there was not a moment apart from 2016 Abu Dhabi where we tried to manage these areas," he added, referring to the call to Hamilton to stop backing up his then teammate Nico Rosberg. "We haven't done since then, but I can understand that as a driver, you want the best out of yourself and the team. Sometimes when it's going against you, you can question.
"As a team, we are 100% on a mission of giving the two drivers two great cars, the best possible cars and the best possible strategies and support.
"We're trying to do the best out of the relationship, trying to maximise the results for what is the final season," he said of Hamilton. "And that, you know, always between drivers and teams can be tense at times because everybody wants to do their best."
Check out our Sunday gallery from Monaco here.