Mercedes 'can't afford another weekend' like Monaco

Sunday evening, it was grimacing in the clan Mercedes at the end of a very complicated race for the German team. 

With the unusual shape of a Lewis Hamilton never in the game added a very missed pit-stop for his teammate Valtteri Bottas, and this while the Finn was able to save the furniture with a solid 2nd place behind Max Verstappen (Red Bull). 

Bottas was simply never able to leave the pits because his right front tire refused to come off because of a wheel nut machined by the rubber change attendant's automatic gun at that location. 

« Valtteri had a disastrous day and ours wasn't much better, whispered the main team Toto wolff. We lacked pace all weekend, it's as simple as that ».

Qualified in a modest 7th place, Hamilton finished in the same place after failing to get the best of Pierre Gasly (Alpha Tauri) and suffered paid attempts toovercut of Sergio Pérez (Red Bull) and Sebastian Vettel (Aston Martin). 

As is often the case on such occasions, the seven-time world champion displayed his bad-day pout.

« It's not a great weekend but I don't want to dwell on it, he declared. There are many things that could have been done better when it comes to preparing for the weekend.

We had good conversations with the team. But we weren't good enough. We win and lose together. It is collectively that we have not done a good job, in all areas. And we will not take the subject lightly. 

But there's no point in being depressed. We're going to analyze the data and see where things went wrong. 

I'm going to be in a meeting over the next few days because everyone wants answers. I know that we will do our utmost to ensure that such a weekend does not happen again. ».

Arriving in Monaco with 14 points ahead of Verstappen, Hamilton leaves 4 behind after the Dutchman's victory in the Principality (105-101 in favor of the Red Bull driver).

« This season is going to be complicated, I've been telling you from the start, added the Mercedes driver. They have a car capable of competing for the title and they will be very hard to beat. 

We won races that we shouldn't have won, like in Bahrain. But it's not over of course, the road is still very long. 

We can't afford to have another weekend like this, but I'm still happy to have scored a few points, and the bonus of the fastest lap in the race ».

Mercedes also gives up the leadership of the Manufacturers' ranking for a small point (Red Bull has 149 units compared to 148 on the German side). A first since the 2018 British Grand Prix!