Toto Wolff notes that they are losing time in high-speed corners, as he praises the work from Honda, while adding their own derate issue.
On outright pace, Red Bull did manage to beat Mercedes in F1 Bahrain GP qualifying, which not only showed some strengths of the former’s car, but also the new Honda power unit. The German outfit came back in the race, but it was an easy task for them.
In fact, post-race, Dr. Helmut Marko revealed that Honda had to trim down on power with some reliability concerns. By this, he noted that despite some concerns, Max Verstappen could still stay on with Mercedes and manage to give a solid fight.
When asked, Wolff said he wasn’t surprised by the step taken by Honda, especially in their last year in F1. The Austrian reckons that this only motivates them to push further, as they wish to solve its issues with the Energy Recovery System, on the derate side.
It means, Mercedes isn’t able to recover enough energy to help itself on the straights. “I think we鈥檙e losing on the high speed corners,” said Wolff to written media. “We can clearly see there鈥檚 a deficit. We鈥檙e losing a little bit on the engine side in terms of derate. We are not yet in a happy place with our energy recovery, but it鈥檚 not one thing we point to where we can say this is the big gap.
“Am I surprised [with Honda’s performance]? No, I鈥檓 actually not at all surprised. I think Honda is a very proud company and I was convinced that they would give it all the power to have a great power unit in the final year as a works team. They left no stone unturned, no resource unutilised, to finish the job properly. So it鈥檚 good motivation for us.
“And I鈥檓 happy for them. As I said, Honda has done a great job, they have delivered a power unit that is extremely competitive look at where AlphaTauri is. And we just have to take it as sportsmen. This is how it looks. You just have to say they鈥檝e done a really good job, full stop. There鈥檚 just no other solution than to recover.
“I believe that on the derate that you see it鈥檚 just something we need to get on top of. It鈥檚 not easy, but we鈥檒l get there,” summed up Wolff. The issue with the derate was confirmed by customer team Williams too, but its chief Dave Robson noted that there is already some improvements seen in Bahrain from the pre-season testing.
Here’s Lewis Hamilton on exciting 2021 season
Here’s Honda on new compact engine
Here鈥檚聽Mercedes explaining Bahrain strategy, pit stop error
Here鈥檚聽FIA pinning Valtteri Bottas for first thorough check
