Wolff fully expects Ferrari in 2016

Despite Nico Rosberg's retirement from the Russian GP, Lewis Hamilton's ninth victory allowed Mercedes to win the Manufacturers' title with four events remaining at the end of the season. Kimi Räikkönen's penalty allowed the German brand to have a 172-point lead over Scuderia Ferrari, a gap now impossible to bridge for the team. Maranello.

“We had already put the T-shirts celebrating this title in the boxes to take them home”, commented Toto wolff, the director of Mercedes Motorsport, quoted on the official F1 website. “We are obviously very happy to have had to bring them out again and we wear them with immense pride. This is a fantastic reward for the team and its employees in Brackley and Brixworth. The Drivers’ title is now the next goal. »

The Austrian is also satisfied with the return to the forefront of Ferrari, the only team to have defeated the Silver Arrows this season with victories in Sebastian Vettel in Sepang (Malaysia), Budapest (Hungary) and Singapore. “It’s good for the discipline to have a competitive competition. It is all the more motivating for us that Ferrari is the team we want to fight with. We expect them to be very strong next year as they put in some great performances earlier than we thought. We could see that Sebastian maintained a very good pace (in Sochi) and that bodes well for a very interesting future.”, added Toto Wolff.

Discover the analysis of the Russian Grand Prix in Sochi carried out by our special correspondents in issue 2033 of AUTOhebdo, available from Monday evening in digital version on all platforms, and from Wednesday on newsstands.