Lewis Hamilton and Toto Wolff agree on Mercedes' 'unique' Singapore GP challenge

14 September 2023 , 05:00

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Lewis Hamilton and Toto Wolff agree on Mercedes' 'unique' Singapore GP challenge

Toto Wolff shares the "hope" held by Lewis Hamilton that the Singapore Grand Prix could be a big opportunity for Mercedes.

The Silver Arrows sit second in the constructors' championship but, with the balance of power changing so regularly, there is rarely a guarantee that they are actually second quickest. Last time out, at the Italian Grand Prix, they were unable to match the race pace of the Ferraris and settle for fifth and sixth.

Though he warned his staff not to get too excited about such a result, team principal Wolff admitted it was probably the best they could have hoped for. "We maximised the result in Monza with the package we had – that will be important across the rest of the season to secure second in the constructors'," he said.

"At a circuit that didn't necessarily suit the characteristics of our car, we were still competitive. It's encouraging to see that the W14 is performing well across a range of tracks. We've had some time to debrief an intense double header and we're now heading into another one."

The Austrian added his belief that it is a track which should be much better suited to Mercedes' W14 cars: "Singapore is a unique challenge for every team. The hot and humid conditions are tough on the drivers, team members and the cars. It's a bumpy track and there are some changes to the layout for this year, too.

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"It should make the lap more flowing and slightly kinder on the tyres. The battle with our nearest competitors is incredibly close. It's hard to predict just how the order will shake out each weekend. Nonetheless, we typically perform better on high downforce tracks, so we're hopeful of a competitive showing."

His optimism mirrors that of Hamilton, who said after the Monza race: "Singapore is all high downforce and, when we put our high downforce wing on, we generally are a little bit better. Not as bad as here. So I hope I'm right."

And trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin has also been singing from the same hymn sheet, adding: "There is a reason to think that the car will work better and that is because Singapore is a maximum downforce circuit. Our performance at the high downforce tracks like at Barcelona, Budapest and even Zandvoort, the car was working well and we've had a pretty strong performance.

"We're hoping to be able to be a bit quicker there and get back to a position where we can challenge for podiums... Plenty of challenges for us to try to tackle, but we are going there optimistic for a strong performance."

Daniel Moxon