Wolff believes 2021 rule changes are vastly underestimated

At the 2020 winter tests, almost a year ago now, Mercedes surprised everyone with their ingenious way of outsmarting the competition. The 'moving' steering wheel in the cockpit of Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas was the talk of the test and everyone wondered what it could be used for.

By pulling the steering wheel towards them on the straights, Mercedes drivers were able to change the position of the wheels last year. Now that the so-called DAS system has been banned for 2021, Toto Wolff can shed some light on the importance of this innovation.

"It was an excellent tool to warm up the tyres," the Mercedes team boss is quoted as saying by Motorsport-Total.com. "But it was not the silver bullet it was often made out to be. We will now have to compensate for that with something else."

Teams must regain downforce

The ban on DAS is far from the biggest challenge for next season. Indeed, according to Wolff, the changes to the cars for 2021 are vastly underestimated. "Everyone is talking about the rule changes for 2022, but there is already a drastic change for 2021 coming up. We're all losing a lot of downforce," the Austrian said.