Nico Rosberg's P4 the best the Silver Arrows can manage after being off the pace all weekend. Will normal service be resumed at Suzuka?
Monday 21 September 2015 08:31, UK
Martin Brundle reckons Mercedes’ troubles at the Singapore GP were track-specific, although he also believes that Ferrari have upped their game this weekend.
Sebastian Vettel claimed his third win of the season at the Marina Bay circuit on Sunday, with team-mate Kimi Raikkonen finishing third.
The best Mercedes could manage was Nico Rosberg's fourth place, with team-mate and title rival Lewis Hamilton retiring with a turbo boost problem.
The net result is that Hamilton's title lead over Rosberg has been cut to 41 points, with Vettel also fancying his chances now after moving to within 50 points of the defending champion.
And the question heading into the Japanese GP is whether Mercedes' lack of performance was a one-off. They struggled with a lack of grip all weekend, with Hamilton 1.5s off Vettel's pace in qualifying.
Brundle thinks so, but reckons Ferrari have also improved. "I think Mercedes didn't hook it up on this track in particular," he said. "But milling around and speaking to some people after this race apparently [Ferrari] have brought some pieces, some trial aero pieces more thinking about 2016, put them on the cars and on Saturday absolutely loved them and put everything on that they could."
The turnaround comes two weeks after both Ferrari and Mercedes introduced engine upgrades at the Italian GP.
On that occasion, the Scuderia mixed it with the Silver Arrows in qualifying, although Hamilton romped to victory in the race, beating Vettel by 25 seconds.
So might normal service be resumed at Suzuka? It's a completely different sort of track from Singapore, of course.
"These guys [Ferrari] have found a really good a really good engine setting now and performance and I think they have found some aero as well - they are on form," Brundle added. "I think we have seen Ferrari very on form and Mercedes very off form."
Don't miss the F1 Midweek Report on Wednesday night at 8.30pm when John Watson and Maurice Hamilton join Anna Woolhouse to discuss the Singapore GP
