F1 News: Toto Wolff Defends Strategy Which Left Lewis Hamilton Behind George Russell

Alex Harrington | Jul 28, 2024

2024 Belgian Grand Prix, Saturday / LAT Images

In a dramatic end to the Belgian Grand Prix, Mercedes' own tire whisperer George Russell triumphed, marking his second victory of the season, while teammate Lewis Hamilton finished behind him, noticeably disappointed. Mercedes chief Toto Wolff has stepped up to explain and defend the strategies deployed, particularly the differing approaches taken with their two drivers.

The race unfolded with Hamilton adopting a two-stop strategy, aimed at maintaining tire performance across the 44 grueling laps. Despite this, the 7-time champion voiced frustrations post-race, indicating that he lost grip in his pit stops, instead of where you want to lose it - in the race.

"My tires were completely fine when I came into the pits on both occasions," Hamilton remarked, shedding light on his perspective of the strategic calls.

On the flip side, Russell's strategy was starkly different, involving just one pit stop. Initially doubted internally, the one-stop strategy was a gamble that paid off handsomely, securing Russell a lead over Hamilton. The decision, as explained by Wolff in detail to Sky, was influenced heavily by strategic positioning against competitors like Charles Leclerc and Lando Norris to prevent potential undercutting.

"We didn’t think it was possible," Wolff admitted, regarding the one-stop strategy. "But, at a certain stage, we said ‘let’s stay out’ because we would have finished fifth anyway, in both scenarios. He made it last."

He continued: "I’d like to have two winners today," he expressed. "But we had to cover Leclerc and Norris because we would’ve been undercut, so that was the call. George had nothing to lose. We were P5."

Following a less competitive practice session on Friday, overnight modifications to the car's floor and resolving a mechanical issue significantly improved performance. Wolff praised the team's effort:

"On Friday we weren’t competitive, so we expected, in the best case, a podium. Then the team did really work well overnight in Brackley. The engineers at the track took the right decision. The car was good on a one-stop.

"We changed the floor. But I don’t think the new floor was bad. On the contrary, we found overnight that we’d tripped on a mechanical issue. We saw that the mechanical issue on the car was better. The new update on the car will come to Zandvoort - that was not the issue on Friday."