Mercedes boss reveals why Lewis Hamilton was unable to overtake Lando Norris - “They just had the better car”

Toto Wolff has opined as to why Lewis Hamilton could not overtake Lando Norris on the softer tire compound during the 2023 British GP. The Mercedes boss said McLaren simply 'had the better car,' despite the upgrades that the Brackley-based outfit had on their cars.

Speaking post-race to Ted Kravitz from Sky Sports, Wolff said:

"Tyres went off. But they just had the better car, to honestly say, being able to hold us on the hard tire efficiently and straightline speed."

Lewis Hamilton, who started the British GP down at P7, was up to P3 after a safety car restart, and on the soft tire compound. Ahead of him was the McLaren of Lando Norris, who was on the hard compound. It was quite apparent to everyone watching that the seven-time world champion would easily overtake the MCL60. However, that didn't happen.

The tire warmup on the McLaren was much better than the Mercedes, and hence, Norris was able to pull away. Meanwhile, Hamilton kept pushing hard but by the time he had the chance to actually overtake, had lost the grip on his tires. This enabled Norris to hold onto P2 and achieve his best result at his home race.

Upon being asked by Kravitz about the future of Mercedes' performance against McLaren, Wolff replied,

"It will be more interesting to see on the more twisted circuits, Budapest. But in any case, they made a huge step ahead, and that's good for us to see that it is possible how quickly you can catch up."

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Lewis Hamilton 'knows' how to improve the Mercedes W14

Mercedes made a huge upgrade in the design of their W14, essentially changing the entire sidepod. This gave them a performance boost in Spain as well as in Canada. However, they lost out in Austria; this was the first time that Lewis Hamilton was challenged by Lando Norris.

A new front wing upgrade was brought into the W14 at Silverstone for the British Grand Prix, promising better performance, but didn't work the way they expected. McLaren was extremely quick on the circuit, qualifying well ahead of both the Mercedes.

Even though Lewis Hamilton made the podium, he mentioned post-race that there is a lot of work needed on the car. He added that there needs to be 'serious conversations' about the same. He said, as quoted by PlanetF1:

"We have a lot of work to do. I think I know exactly what we need to do, and I think we’ve got to have some serious conversations about what are we going to do moving forward."