Bojan Vrbnjak
When he was Jean Todt, today's president FIA, another team boss Ferrari, once stated: “My biggest drive is fear - the fear of defeat. It drives me night and day." Toto wolff, team boss Mercedes, did not want to express himself so drastically, but his thought nevertheless goes in a similar direction. A journalist once asked him about tires and started the question as follows: “Are you worried that…“Team leader Mercedes so he began his answer with the sentence: “I'm always worried."
The Austrian cultivates a great deal of respect for rivals, he is always careful because he knows very well that he is bloating the first step in the direction of defeat. A little demonstrative pessimism however, it never hurts to attribute better form to a competitor than it actually is, and this has two consequences. First of all, it’s a strong initiative for your own team to stay awake. Second, a competitor may fall asleep a bit and believe that he is more competitive than he actually seems.
In any case Wolff looks anxiously at both races scheduled after the summer break: Hot Tub in Monza, both very fast tracks. “The Ferrari Hungaroring was not the best fit,”Says the team boss Mercedes. "However, they have a very powerful engine and race car with less air resistance, which makes me sure we will experience a powerful Ferrari in Belgium and Italy. I am convinced that we are facing two difficult tasks and if we want to be competitive in Belgium, then we need to improve."
For memory refresh only: Mercedes has won ten of a total of twelve races this year, far ahead of everyone in the championship. Ferrari however, it still has zero in its accounts - in terms of victories. And if we look at the statistics of the hybrid period Formula 1 for both mentioned tracks, then Typhoid they don’t really have much hope that Ferrari will declassify all rivals at Spa and Monza.
GP of Belgium - Spa Francorchamps
MERCEDES
All 5 pole positions since 2014
(Rosberg 2014 and 2016, Hamilton 2015, 2017, 2018)
3 wins
(Hamilton 2015 in 2017, Rosberg 2016)
FERRARI
0 field positions
1 win
(Sebastian Vettel 2018)
GP of Italy - Monza
MERCEDES
4 field positions
(Hamilton from 2014 to 2017)
All 5 wins
(Hamilton 2014, 2015, 2017 and 2018, Rosberg 2016)
FERRARI
1nd pole position
(Kimi Raikkonen 2018)
0 wins
