Toto Wolff, Mercedes Formula 1 Boss, says the team has halted the development of the 2020 car early in the season. Red Bull has improved its car over the season and narrowed the gap at German Grand Prix.
Mercedes performance has been outstanding through the season 2020. It managed to win 9 out of 11 races.
Currently, team is leading with 739 points while Lewis Hamilton lead the championship with 413 points. Valterri Bottas tails the world champion with 326 points, while Max Verstappen is at third with 278 points.
Red Bull has made progress and reduced the performance deficiency. It appeared the team has achieved Mercedes’ level with new updates at Nurburgring .
Verstappen marked the fastest time during final runs of Q3. He managed to press Mercedes drivers in the opening races.
Alex Albon appreciated the newly upgrades to RB16. He also felt “a lot closer”to Mercedes.
READ MORE: Ferrari: Upgraded SF1000 at Eifel GP
The German team did not introduced for a number of races. Wolff admitted that team had stopped development for its W11 machine.
“We finished [the updates] a long time ago, and that has always been in the past,” Wolff said.
“What we looked at is a very thoroughly thought through decision, because not in every championship can you afford to close the book early.
“But the rules changed quite a lot for next year and in that respect, like in previous years, we decided to switch to next year’s car.
“This is why you can see the shifting performance between the teams. We always have a very strong start and middle of the season, and then whoever continues to develop is strong at the end.”
Andrew Shovlin, Mercedes track side engineering director, agreed with Wolff on Red Bull progress.
“I think they are developing quicker than we are at the moment,” said Shovlin.
“And we’ve seen that progressively. But to be honest, we’ve seen that in most of the recent years, they tend not to start as strongly as we do.
“I can’t really think of a year recently where they’ve not been with us by the end.
“So if we see that trend continue, then the remaining races are going to get tougher, and it will be harder to try and keep getting the pole on Saturday and winning on a Sunday.”
