TOTO WOLFF says Mercedes “won’t get carried away” by their “promising” result in Saudi Arabia.
George Russell was fourth while Lewis Hamilton came home in fifth place in Jeddah.
Merc boss Toto Wolff isn’t getting carried away
But despite the solid result, it is not enough to convince Wolff from ditching this season’s car in favour of some sweeping design changes.
Speaking ahead of this weekend’s Australian GP, Wolff said: “The progress we saw in Saudi Arabia was encouraging.
“We maximised the package we had and scored some solid points.
“More importantly, we continued to learn and understand more about our development direction.
“Everyone back at base has been hard at work to turn these learnings into performance.
“The signs we are seeing back at the factory are promising.
“We have got to take it step by step, though, and won’t get carried away until we see performance translated into lap time on track.
“The competitive order behind Red Bull is tight, with small margins having a big effect on points scored.
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“There remains a significant gap to the front and that is ultimately what we are interested in closing.”
Wolff, 51, previously warned that Mercedes remain half a year away from competing back at the top of the order.
He said: “I think the lag is probably between six and 12 months, because that’s the time it really took for us to figure out what was actually happening with the [2022] car.
“That means we just need to double the development speed, a stronger development slope which the logic and rationale speaks for it, that we could have [it].”
