Wolff: ‘Unacceptable’ Mercedes calling my worst in F1 for 10 years

Just a run from george russellthe shock pole position in Hungary, mercedes found himself unable to find answers as to why he is so late at Spa-Francorchamps.

A weekend where grid penalties for a number of leading riders gave Mercedes another good shot at victory, Lewis Hamilton and George Russell was only seventh and eighth fastest.

But more concerning was the fact that Hamilton was a whopping 1.838 seconds slower than the leader Max Verstappenit’s Red Bull.

Wolff said such a dramatic turn of fortune for Mercedes from Hungary was not something for him.

“You can’t be on pole three weeks before, albeit in very different conditions, at a different circuit, and then be 1.8 seconds off the pace the next,” he said. “So there is something that we absolutely do not understand or seem to understand.

“Obviously Red Bull is in a league of its own here, like the next Ferrari is eight tenths. But that’s no consolation.

“For me, this is the worst qualifying session I’ve had in 10 years. And whatever positions we’re going to start tomorrow, being on pole the weekend before and three weeks later being nowhere, that’s just not acceptable to ourselves.

Hamilton, who will line up fourth on the grid thanks to qualifying cars ahead of him having engine change penalties, said he was struggling to get an explanation for what went wrong.

“I never thought it would be two seconds late. It’s much, much worse than I thought,” he said.

“Of course it doesn’t make sense but that’s all, we tried everything. I assembled and disassembled everything, changed wings, changed set-up, I did everything this weekend.

“I’ve tried a lot of things and it’s surprising to see us [so far off]. Maybe they have advanced, I don’t know if they have upgrades or not, but it’s hard.

Wolff echoed that there was no obvious answer as to why Mercedes was so slow, as there were a number of factors that came into play.

“I mean, if we understood, we could sort it out,” he said. “But the car drags in a straight line. Lewis said it was like dragging a parachute behind him.

“It’s unstable at the back. It understeers through [Turns] eight and nine. It bounces at high speed and gives no confidence.

“I mean, there’s nothing positive I’ve heard about the performance of the car here this weekend and throughout the weekend. So I think it’s time to consolidate and decide what to do next year.