Toto Wolff pins Mercedes blame as Lewis Hamilton left despondent ahead of Ferrari move

Toto Wolff has explained that Mercedes are struggling to perform because their wind tunnel data is not correlating with on-track performance. The Silver Arrows have endured a torrid start to the new campaign, with George Russell and Ferrari-bound Lewis Hamilton claiming just 26 points between them.

Things were looking up for Mercedes after ditching their failed 'zeropod' concept, which was fully abandoned as part of a change in design philosophy for 2024. However, they have struggled to live up to expectations with their current W15 challenger proving temperamental despite their wind tunnel data suggesting otherwise.

Discussing where the problems lie at Mercedes, Wolff explained that his team's findings have not been matching how the car has been performing on track.

He said: "When I look at the positives, I think we took many potential root causes out of the equation. We weren't sure about our suspension. We weren't sure about the stiffness of our gearbox carrier. We had a vibrating steering rack. All of those things have disappeared.

"But fundamentally, whatever we see in the tunnel doesn't correlate with what's happening on the track."

Wolff went on to insist that Mercedes are not being held back by 'dogmatism' from their engineering department, with the issue being a wider and more complex problem to which there is no easy solution.

"It is not a single person that says: 'I would interpret that data in this way', and because of a dogma, because of dogmatism, we're not making any progress," he added. "I don't see dogmatism.

"I see an open environment where people share, where people take themselves by the nose and say, 'Maybe in my area we are making mistakes'. It's so tough in my career, in everything I've done before, be it in finance and investment, that you know which screws to turn.

"Sometimes it takes time because back in my Williams days, I knew what was missing, but here I don't think we are missing something. It is just a complication of what's happening with the car that we can't see. It's like an on-off switch."

It comes after Hamilton was unable to explain Mercedes' struggles after retiring from last weekend's Australian Grand Prix due to an engine failure. The 39-year-old has found it particularly hard to get to grips with the W15, having finished no higher than seventh in the first three races of the year.

"It's the worst start to a season I've ever had, it's worse than 2009," said Hamilton. "It's tough on the spirit for everyone in the team when so much work has been going on over the winter. You come in excited, driven and motivated, with the mindset you're going to be fighting for wins, then that's not the case.

"Then you think okay, maybe second or third, and that's not the case and it cascades a bit further down and you go through the motions. It's challenging."