” There was no, zero group orders. No concealed, no subtle, and no direct.”
” Weve had it in Budapest numerous years earlier, and we almost got surpassed by [Max] Verstappen. The thinking that I had was that you need to describe to Valtteri what is going on, that there is a five-second charge, and after that ask Lewis in the last lap to let Valtteri pass once again.
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The pit wall went over the concept of informing Bottas to let Hamilton through so the British motorist could extend a space to secure second location, but in the end it was felt too made complex a scenario to manage.
Asked after the race about if group orders were used, Mercedes employer Toto Wolff stated: “Dont get paranoid! This is absolutely nothing to do with Multi 21.
Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton were leading the season opener, but both were dealing with critical gearbox problems that Mercedes feared could cause them to retire from the race.
That message prompted memories of the Multi 21 radio call that Red Bull notoriously distributed to Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber at the 2013 Malaysian Grand Prix that was neglected and prompted substantial controversy.
Norris on fresh tyres are on his transmission, then undoubtedly Valtteri rather than winning the race ends up fourth. Too much complexity to do such a switch. Too much danger.”
Wolff added: “Maybe with all the information later on we would have gotten P3. There was a conversation, however that begins to get truly messy.
Check out Also: The only time Mercedes did consider possibly hindering the positions remained in the closing stages when Hamilton had a five-second charge for his accident with Alex Albon.
As well as both motorists being alerted to deflect the kerbs, there was a good deal of intrigue when Bottas was provided the radio message: “Urgent Chassis Default Two One.”
Verstappen. The thinking that I had was that you need to discuss to Valtteri what is going on, that there is a five-second charge, and then ask Lewis in the last lap to let Valtteri pass once again.
” We have never played that, unless there was a problem on the cars and truck, and we would never ever interfere in a battle in the very first few races of a season. They were totally free to race each other.
” What we did, that we always do on both automobiles, we offered them the exact same recommendations to stay off the kerbs. And since there was no rival generally at a certain stage, we changed the engines to a lower mode to secure the power unit.
Norris on fresh tyres are on his gearbox, then undoubtedly Valtteri rather than winning the race ends up fourth. Too much intricacy to do such a switch. Too much threat.”
