Wolff explains Mercedes' poor performance in Turkey

Mercedes managed to secure pole position for every Grand Prix this year until this weekend. In Turkey it was however not possible. In fact, Mercedes has had a terrible qualifying session. Toto Wolff explains why that happened.

Lewis Hamilton has been at the top of the timesheets in qualifying almost every race weekend, especially when it comes to lap times in Q3. Add to that a heavy downpour of rain and it seemed likely he would take another pole. The Mercedes driver couldn't do more than P6, while Valtteri Bottas has to start from P9.

Toto Wolff said it wasn't a good day for Mercedes. "It was cold and wet on a newly surfaced tarmac and in the end these unusual circumstances caught us out as we couldn't get the tyres to work. We didn't really get on top of these issues all weekend long and that's why we ended up P6 and P9 on the grid," explained the team boss in Mercedes' review of the day.

Learning from the mistakes made

However, the Austrian does see a positive point in the bad day for the team. "As we always say, the days where we are beaten are the days where we learn the most. I'm absolutely confident that the team that will analyse the situation and try and understand our issues today, will help us progress and make sure that we will be stronger in similar circumstances next year," Wolff continues.

"Congratulations to the Racing Points - to Lance for his pole position and to Checo for being right up there as well. I'm looking forward to an exciting race tomorrow," concluded the Austrian.