Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff on driver safety: "It's all fair that we're having political fights about performance gains, but I think that some of them are taking it too lightly when you look at drivers' health"
Sunday 19 June 2022 00:30, UK
Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff insists driver safety is being taken "too lightly" amid the problems caused by porpoising in Formula One cars.
Earlier this week, the FIA announced new measures in an attempt to combat 'porpoising' amid concerns over Formula 1 drivers' safety, and it has continued to be a major talking point in Montreal ahead of Sunday's Canadian Grand Prix.
The severe bouncing of cars has been an unexpected issue following the introduction of F1's all-new design regulations for 2022, with Mercedes one of the worst impacted teams.
Lewis Hamilton has complained about the problem throughout the season, but with the bumpy Baku street circuit at last weekend's Azerbaijan GP exacerbating the issue and leaving the seven-time world champion in severe pain after the race, the F1's governing body has taken action.
Despite the changes, Wolff has admitted he was left upset after what has been described as a 'feisty' team principles' meeting on Saturday morning, when the Mercedes boss spoke to other team bosses on the bouncing and porpoising issues affecting drivers on the grid.
He told Sky Sports F1: "Yes, sometimes you're getting upset… I believe that what we've seen in Baku and here is that every driver from every team, including the front-runners, has said that they are suffering from the bouncing or the bottoming. Perez was saying that he had blurred vision.
"It's all fair that we're having political fights about performance gains, but I think that some of them are taking it too lightly when you look at drivers' health."
When asked if he thought it was too dangerous to run these cars, he added: "I think in Baku it was definitely too dangerous to run these cars. Every single on suffered and you could see that the bottoming on the straight was quite dangerous. We saw it yesterday here too."
Mercedes struggles have been well documented so far this season.
They have managed just four third-placed finishes this season - one for Hamilton and three for George Russell - while rivals Red Bull and Ferrari have won every race between them.
They currently sit third in the constructor standings, 118 points behind leaders Red Bull, and Wolff admitted in an interview with Sky Sports F1's Martin Brundle that mistakes have been made by his team, but he insists they know which direction they need to head to improve performance.
"I think we got it, probably wrong, in terms of what we expected in terms of mechanical grip and downforce that our car is just too low for what you can realistically run," he said.
"It's a direction that we need to change, we're doing that but it's very slow.
"I'm with you, it's not what we expected from ourselves or where we should be?"
On improvements, he added: "I believe that we know pretty well where we need to head. You can see that in all the other cars, we are running flat on the ground, the others have more rake. So, we need to develop in a different way and that's what happening."
Along with the team's struggles, Hamilton's problems this season have also been well documented.
The seven-time world champion missed out on an eighth title on the final lap of last season to Max Verstappen and after that disappointment, he has finished on the podium just once this season.
And since his third-place finish in Bahrain, he has also finish behind Mercedes team-mate George Russell in every race since.
He's driving very maturely. Fast. I admire is that I'm listening in the debrief and whether he's P3 or P12 he's always using the same tone of voice and logic with a clear target for optimising his performances.
However, despite his poor results so far this season, Wolff believes the last lap disappointment is not affecting Hamilton on the track this season.
"I think that Abu Dhabi certainly hurts a lot," Wolff said. "I can relate. I know how it feels with me, but I haven't been in a car and lost an eighth record-winning world championship.
"But I don't think it affects his performance in the car. I think it's probably something that's in the back of the mind sometimes when you're alone and switching the light off, that you're annoyed about it."
Coverage of the Canadian GP starts at 5.30pm BST on Sunday evening with lights out at 7pm.
Sunday, June 19
5:30pm: Grand Prix Sunday: Canada
7pm: THE CANADIAN GRAND PRIX
9pm: The Chequered Flag: Canada
10pm: Ted's Notebook: Canada
11pm: Canadian Grand Prix highlights
