Wolff frustrated after Mercedes' 'humbling experience' in Imola sprint race

The Emilia Romagna Grand Prix at the Imola circuit will take place on Sunday following the events of the sprint race. With rain a possibility anything is still possible for Mercedes, but Toto Wolff believes this weekend is already a "humbling experience."

Wolff very disappointed

After the race, Wolff was understandably frustrated as both his drivers failed to score points. George Russell and Lewis Hamilton both exited qualifying in Q2 and neither could drag their car into the top eight or even the top 10 during the sprint race.

In an official Mercedes press release, Wolff expressed his anger at the situation currently happening at the team, especially as he believes the team had reasonable pace. "What we saw today was a car without enough of a performance differential to the midfield cars to make the overtakes," he said. "If we were running in free air, the picture would be similar to previous races where we moved forward but behind the cars in a DRS train, the car didn't have enough performance to make progress.

"Point-scoring needs to be the minimum for tomorrow and we know that isn't any where near our expectations, so it's a humbling experience," he admitted. "We understand our problems, we have a direction to unlock the potential that is within the car to bring us much closer to the front but at the moment, we don't have the key. Therefore you just need to grind away and rely on the science and the physics. The passion and determination to improve is there in every team member," Wolff concluded.

With porpoising still an issue, Mercedes haven't been able to find pace in their car and it's resulted in them dropping back towards the midfield. The results of the sprint race saw Carlos Sainz move ahead of Russell in Drivers' Championship, while the German team dropped below Red Bull in the Constructors' standings, despite the fact Christian Horner's team have experienced three retirements in three non-sprint races so far this season.