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Toto Wolff Puts a Miserable Number on Mercedes’ Decaying Title Chances

Published 04/20/2022, 11:15 AM EDT

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With just three races down and twenty to go before the end of the 2022 Formula One season, there are already more than a handful of storylines from the opening rounds. One of the major stories is Mercedes’ struggles to match the pace of Red Bull and Ferrari. The Brackley- based team is already 39 points behind runaway leaders Ferrari.


It seems the glory days are over for the Silver Arrows, who are on the receiving end of a fair amount of criticism for their lack of pace so far in 2022. After dominating F1 for the past decade and winning every title on offer, the team’s recent struggles have been talked about a lot.

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Team Principal Toto Wolff is not optimistic about Mercedes’ chances of winning another title. Wolff’s honest admission will not come as a surprise to the Mercedes faithful. However, he is not willing to give up their chances of fighting for the Championship.

Toto Wolff admits Mercedes may not catch up to Ferrari

The Silver Arrows is second on the constructors’ standings, but their pace has not been encouraging. They have capitalized on Red Bull’s reliability issues so far. Toto Wolff is downbeat on Mercedes’ chances of snatching another title. However, he believes the team still can fight with Ferrari at the top.

via Reuters

He said, “I think we are on the back foot. If I look at it from a mathematical standpoint and probability, I’d probably say that the odds are 20/80. But this is motor racing and in motor racing, anything can happen. Teams can DNF and if we unlock the potential of the car we are right back in the game.”

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The Austrian also feels the odds are stacked against them. “So as a motor racer I’d maybe say 40/60, as a mathematician the odds are worse against us. “We are not going to write the title off but it’s just the current status quo – we are 0.9s off,” Wolff added.

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Lewis Hamilton’s Q1 elimination in Saudi Arabia was a shocking result. It was his first elimination in Q1 since Brazil 2017. They have suffered from porpoising issues, but their reliability has been better than Red Bull. However, they cannot keep expecting to take advantage of Red Bull’s woes.

With new upgrades lined up, the Silver Arrows will hope to bounce back. Can they pull a rabbit out of a hat and win the championship? We will have to wait and watch.

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Written by:

Rahul Madhavan

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Rahul Madhavan is a Formula 1 writer at EssentiallySports. After completing his Bachelor's degree in business administration, he is pursuing his love for sports in the form of writing. Rahul is an avid McLaren fan, who also enjoys writing about soccer.
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Edited by:

Ranvijay Singh