Mercedes boss back George Russell's claim of a Red Bull clean sweep: "They don’t even have tire wear"

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff has backed his driver George Russell's claims of a Red Bull domination throughout the 2023 season.

The Austrian team won the opening race of the season in emphatic fashion, registering a one-two and finishing almost 40 seconds ahead of third-placed Fernando Alonso. Mercedes finished P5 and P7, with Lewis Hamilton finishing ahead of Russell.

After the race, the young Brit mentioned that Red Bull could win every single race in 2023. Speaking to OE24, Wolff gave his opinion on Russell's comments, saying:

“With my sporting aspirations, it was bad to see our deficit. We don’t want to finish second, we want to win. But there is a team mile ahead. They are playing with the competition, they don’t even have tire wear. After the first grand prix I also believe that they will win every race this year.”

Wolff was also critical of Mercedes' performance and suggested that they might change the concept mid-season, adding:

“You have to look reality in the eye and look for solutions. We can at least do better and see how we can get out of the unfavorable situation we maneuvered ourselves into. Last year our car got better and better and still won races. That’s why we decided to stick with the concept. Then you start the new season and suddenly see that nothing works.”

---

“I think we’ve almost doubled if not tripled (the deficit) to get to Red Bull" - Mercedes team boss

Toto Wolff mentioned that Mercedes have fallen further behind Red Bull this season compared to 2022, revealing that the gap to the world champions may even have "tripled".

Speaking to PlanetF1, he said:

“That’s a good question and we will tackle it straight at the beginning of the week. When you look at where we were at the end of the season, where it seemed like we caught up a lot, it was just a matter of which circuits suited us and which did not. I think we’ve almost doubled if not tripled [the deficit] to get to Red Bull. This is what we need to look at.

“Everything is bad. The single-lap pace is still good but in the race, we saw the consequences and to put it bluntly, we are lacking downforce and sliding the tires and going backward.”

It would be interesting to see if Mercedes are seriously considering pulling themselves out of the championship this early in the season.