As was the case with the Monaco Grand Prix, Mercedes drivers Lewis Hamilton and George Russell suffered a sharp rebound in free practice for the Azerbaijani Grand Prix.
Russell finished FP2 in seventh 1.3 s behind leader Charles Leclerc, while Hamilton followed three tenths in 12th.
The team was mainly lagging behind in the top speed lists, with speeds between 11 and 20 km / h below its rivals in the huge 2.2 km straight from Baku, which according to Wolff cost on the computer up to one second per lap.
Wolff said his drivers felt like there was a parachute behind the W13, which, coupled with the rebound problems, restricted the car’s top speed.
“We have a car that is too dragged, so the drivers commented that it looks like we have a parachute behind the car. So between the dragged car and the bottom, this is the main deficit that we are seeing here on the straight.” and Wolff.
“Others like Ferrari have it, even a little worse, but in the different parts of the track we are touching the bottom badly, which affects our aerodynamics and greatly affects our speed in a straight line. And as a result, the route is not very good.
George Russell, Mercedes W13
Photo by: Steve Etherington / Motorsport Images
“And that can cost several tenths of a second and yesterday we were losing a second in the straights against Ferrari and Red Bull.
While Ferrari and Red Bull benefit from more powerful engines than last year, Wolff does not believe that his power unit, a traditional Mercedes stronghold, has suddenly become a weakness and a factor in his maximum speed deficit.
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On one occasion when the car did not face its dramatic porpoise problems at last month’s Spanish Grand Prix, Hamilton and Russell were suddenly much higher on the top speed lists.
“I think our engines did a great job of understanding how we can optimize the software and the deployment of the power unit from the beginning of the year, so our problem here is not the engine,” Wolff said.
“In Barcelona we had a big rear spoiler, the car was quite stable on the straight and we were one of the fastest, but there is never a thing and certainly the engine is not the area where I want to aim.”