Valtteri Bottas has admitted the Austrian Grand Prix was more difficult than the team originally expected as he finished in P3 and Lewis Hamilton finished in fifth.
Mercedes had been off the pace all weekend in Austria, and they failed to qualify on the front row for the first time since Bahrain. As Mercedes managed cooling at the Red Bull Ring, Ferrari seemed to have made inroads into the Silver Arrow's dominance with Charles Leclerc dominating for most of the weekend and Sebastian Vettel overtaking Lewis Hamilton in the closing stages.
With Mercedes failing to win for the first time this season, Bottas felt the team were on pace with the rest of the leaders, but felt the temperature management cost them.
"I think we made a good start of it - it was a bit more difficult than we expected especially with the overheating of the engine we had to manage the temperature but we got some good points.
"We were up there on pure race pace - there were not much difference, but while managing temperatures we had to drop back."