Toto Wolff says Lewis Hamilton has car capable of winning 2023 F1 title

By Tom Cary Toto Wolff, the Mercedes team principal, sounded a defiant note at the end of the first day of pre-season testing in Bahrain, saying he hopes to see his drivers Lewis Hamilton and George Russell fight for the title in 2023. In stark contrast to the doom and gloom which engulfed the Silver Arrows 12 months ago, when they first realised the extent of their issues with “porpoising” – or bouncing – Wolff said the car this year looked “balanced” on its first real outing. “You need to provide a good car for a driver that has the ambition to win races and championships and we have that,” Wolff said.

“We want to win. At this stage last year, we knew we were in trouble because the car was bouncing around and we were not able to drive it correctly. “But today, it is very different.

The car seems to be balanced in the right way. There is no bouncing which is good news. It is a good starting point.

” Red Bull’s double world champion Max Verstappen topped the timesheets on the first day of practice, underlining his status as favourite for the title this year. The Dutchman was the only driver to run all day, completing 157 laps, almost three race distances. Every other team split running between two drivers.

Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso was second fastest, ahead of the two Ferraris of Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc. McLaren’s Lando Norris, who sat in the garage for much of the afternoon as his car suffered from reliability problems, managed to get in a quick lap late in the day to go fifth fastest. Hamilton was sixth fastest.

If Mercedes have got a winning car, the battle between Hamilton, who is gunning for a record eighth world title this season, and Russell, who is hoping for a first, should be fascinating. Russell got the better of his older colleague in their first season together, but Hamilton was starting to look more like his old self in the second half of the year. The 38 year-old is out of contract at the end of this season but both he and Mercedes have stated their intention is to renew.

Pre-season testing concludes on Saturday ahead of the opening grand prix of the year, also in Bahrain, a week on Sunday. The seven-times world champion, who was pictured inspecting Verstappen’s Red Bull during a filming shoot ahead of the day’s running, is heading into the final year of his £40million-a-season contract. But the noise from both the British driver, 38, and Mercedes is that an extension will be signed, regardless of their on-track form.

Wolff continued: “I am amazed because Lewis has been with the team for 10 years and every year he just come backs more mature, more professional and more understanding of what is good for him. He is in high spirits and super-determined. ” A couple of medium-length stoppages for both Aston Martin’s Felipe Drugovich and McLaren’s Lando Norris, but they still managed 40 laps each.

That is a big total for Max Verstappen. He was the only driver who ran in both sessions, but this is still a mega total. That’s it for the day in Bahrain, then.

157 laps for Verstappen. Nyck de Vries spends his final lap very close to the rear wing of Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari before sending one up the inside at turn 11. But he’s on the hard tyres and on a long-run.

A 20-lap long run, in fact. Verstappen, Leclerc, Hamilton, De Vries, Ocon and Magnussen. Leclerc has gone out with some struts from the back of the nose to the edges of the front wing where the endplate begins.

I am sure it’s just a test of some kind rather than a performance part. . .

but it is obviously ultimately linked to performance. The Ferrari looks to be running low as it smashes into the bumps at turn one, creating a shower of sparks. Which means it’s time for an FIA systems check! So we’ll go from a yellow flag to a VSC test with some of the cars running on track.

He has a big lock-up at turn one. Lando Norris, currently eighth, is starting his his 39th lap. He ends it fifth, though, with a time 0.

625s off Verstappen. The McLaren isn’t looking too great at the moment. But it does look a little scrappy and he’s down on Verstappen’s time after the first sector and again after two sectors – by 0.

280s in total. Not too bad. He crosses the line 0.

219s down on his previous lap despite stuffing up the last corner. Probably on a par with his previous lap had he not got a tank slapper on and run wide. Maybe even faster than Verstappen.

Not that that in itself is worth anything. So here’s a quick update as we approach the final 30 minutes: But Alonso goes just 0. 029sec off that with a decent lap on the medium tyres.

He is approaching 50 laps for the day. Norris goes eighth on the medium tyres, 1. 260sec off Verstappen’s fastest time as we enter the final hour of the session and first day.

Red Bull: 134 Williams: 132 Alfa Romeo: 116 Mercedes: 114 Ferrari: 113 AlphaTauri: 100 Alpine: 97 Haas: 94 Aston Martin: 84 McLaren: 78 No disasters in that lot and it’s only been McLaren and Aston Martin who have had anything like prolonged stoppages. Not so far anyway. Ocon finishes his 37th lap and moves 16th, two seconds off the pace.

Earlier in the day Pierre Gasly did 60 laps and is currently 15th. 25 laps so far from him today, so 20 in the 45 minutes or so since he returned to the track after that lengthy break. Meanwhile, Verstappen begins a new stint on the medium tyres.

127 laps for the Red Bull so far today. I’ll go through my notebook and add up what all the teams have achieved so far today shortly. .

. . but it’s nice to see Fernando Alonso go back to an older-style helmet.

I’m quite excited about what Alonso can do at Aston Martin this year. It’s actually also a good opportunity for Lance Stroll. If he can pull out consistent performances relative to Alonso, his reputation will soar.

Not sure I’d count on that, though. Stroll has been excellent on his day, it’s just that he tends to get about five or six of them a season. 36 laps for Hamilton so far, 34 for Alonso and Leclerc, 41 for Bottas, 43 for De Vries, 48 for Sargeant, 33 for Magnussen, 31 for Ocon and 19 for Norris, who is back out there.

Just Hamilton, Bottas and Sargeant out on track, shortly joined by Bottas. Norris’s 10-lap stint ended, so he is currently on 15 laps. Guessing they will probably be checking to see how their “fix” worked.

. . .

and then the morning session. So he’ll be done in under a day. He has racked up 121 laps for the day so far.

Will probably end on 140-odd you’d imagine. 150 too much? Surely not. He’s onto his sixth lap on this stint now.

Lando Norris exits the McLaren garage for his sixth lap of the afternoon. He’s lost about 30-40 laps on some of his rivals, but there’s enough time for McLaren to make that up over the next couple of days. And that means more opportunity for moody shots of F1 cars like this.

A 1:32. 837 is just over a tenth quicker than his previous fastest. He looked to be pushing, in fairness.

He was on the medium tyres. 2hr15min remaining, two hours gone. .

. . but the Mercedes looks a bit more stable than it was last year and perhaps even more so than some of the other cars.

Hamilton crosses the line with his fastest lap of the test to go third, 0. 549sec off Verstappen’s time. Sounds like it is a brake issue which they’re trying to fix on the McLaren.

Well, come up with a temporary fix so they can get the car back on track. Just five laps on the board in this session for Lando Norris. Piastri didn’t manage a bagload in the first session either, though 52 isn’t too bad.

Still, nearly two hours gone in this session and five laps is bad. Could be a critical year at the team. After three years in the top four they dropped out of it in 2022.

Norris is in the car but without his helmet on. Looks like adjustments are being made somewhere (on the wheel defenders and braking area) but the car doesn’t look to be close to getting on-track. Yes, some of that was partly due to Daniel Ricciardo’s under-performance but Alpine ended the year very strongly and had reliability issues which hampered them, too.

That head is bobbing up and down at the end of the straight again. . .

I think so, anyway, whatever happens. If their car is poor again, then that is something. .

. and how will Hamilton respond to that? And if they are closer to the front, then I can’t wait to see the Hamilton vs Russell battle. .

. or even a Hamilton vs Verstappen one? Let’s not get ahead of ourselves on that front. .

. Again, lap times are not really worth reading too much into, but while they’re setting them we’ll keep you informed. Hamilton has moved into fifth, 0.

942s off Verstappen and Leclerc is in seventh, 1. 393s away from the Red Bull driver. He has had limited running so far this afternoon after sustaining some floor damage on his first couple of laps.

He’s likely to be the only man, in fairness as everyone else running today is only getting one session. Leclerc gets a big tank-slapper on in the middle sector – that would have been a scary moment. LEC 1:34.

896 – 17 laps BOT 1:35. 206 – 15 laps HAM 1:35. 958 – 14 laps MAG 1:36.

225 – 13 laps SAR 1:36. 556 – 14 laps NOR 1:36. 872 – 5 laps DEV 1:37.

532 – 18 laps OCO 1:39. 848 – 7 laps ALO (NO TIME) – 2 laps Slow-motion replays show that the Ferrari of Charles Leclerc isn’t running very close to the ground at all. Mind you, neither is the Red Bull.

It’s still day one of the first test, though. Mercedes are also sticking with their skinny sidepod design for 2023. .

. Bottas and De Vries are the only two drivers of the afternoon-only bunch to have reached 10 laps. Some work going on Ocon’s car at the moment.

They are speed-taping the mirrors. Doesn’t look like any became dislodged on his previous run but they were shaking a little. They do tend to do that.

3hr20min remaining in this session. Obviously the regulations are fairly stable from 2022 to 2023, with some changes to the floor and front wing perhaps the most significant. 2022 brought about the biggest changes since 2016 and the biggest change in aero regulations for nearly 25 years.

You would expect the order to be roughly the same as last year but that is not to say that you should be too surprised if team other than Red Bull is fastest in Bahrain, or another team leads the midfield. Teams will have learned a lot through last year which they will put into practice (they hope) on the new cars. And, of course, there are a few teams who have more room for improvement.

I’d be interested to see how Williams do this year. Last year was a bit of a disappointment. As Magnussen has a big lock up in the Haas.

Hulkenberg struggled with that earlier today. They are the Nordic pair of Kevin Magnussen and Valtteri Bottas. Hamilton has done three laps in the new Mercedes W14, but most drivers just doing in and out (and slow) laps at the moment.

Leclerc in the Ferrari with a bunch of aero rakes on the front and rear, Esteban Ocon in the Alpine and Logan Sargeant getting his first taste of the Williams today. And Lewis Hamilton gets his helmet on and is about to get into the car. Nyck de Vries is out in the AlphaTauri for his first laps of the test.

Charles Leclerc is climbing into the Ferrari. . .

but, in fact, it is Max Verstappen who is the first car our. Again, the only man to have the whole first day to himself. He also has the track to himself now.

As there are no cars on track. This is often the case. Again, it’s a 4hr15min session which takes us up to 4.

30pm UK time. The lights will be on by the end of the session, as they will be for qualifying and the race next week. The second session gets under way in a few minutes’ time.

Here is a reminder of who we have in each car this afternoon, with only Verstappen doing the whole day. The earlier typo on McLaren is corrected. It is of course Norris in the car.

Red Bull: Verstappen Ferrari: Leclerc Mercedes: Hamilton Alpine: Ocon McLaren: Norris Aston Martin: Alonso Alfa Romeo: Bottas Haas: Magnussen AlphaTauri: De Vries Williams: Sargeant Lap times and lap count after 4h15min: The second session of the day begins at 12. 15GMT and we will be back for then. He’s two seconds off Verstappen in the first sector alone, so not really an attack lap as it were.

His 69th lap of the morning. Hamilton jumping in the car in an hour or so. Not that we ever really stopped.

Anyway, we’re into the final five or so minutes. Just Verstappen, Zhou and Gasly on track at the moment. In sector two.

Every car looks to be moving on track, but it could be one of those FIA systems checks they tend to do at the end of sessions. And we’ve now moved to the Virtual Safety Car. So it definitely is an FIA systems check.

Didn’t seem to lock the fronts, but it took an age to turn in and he just sort of abandoned any hope of finding the apex. Tricky one, that. Perhaps it is no surprise that the Horner vs Wolff rivalry is rekindled in front of the TV cameras.

. . Verstappen, Albon, Zhou, Russell, Hulkenberg, Gasly and Drugovich all out there as we enter the final 30 minutes of the session.

Obviously, we’ll see more of it as the cars are lowered closer to the ground to replicate more realistic set-ups. The bump at the braking zone of turn one isn’t helping, though. One hour remaining in the session: But Sainz leads Verstappen by 0.

296sec. Sainz, Verstappen and Albon have all passed the 50 lap barrier. Thankfully no teams have been deprived of track time for too long, but problems could come later in the test – they often do.

You always see it, along with the aero rakes, at testing. It is short for (aero) flow visualisation and helps the team understand how the air interacts with their car. There is a bit for Haas at the end of the pit straight and particularly on the Ferrari coming through turn four.

. . The most of anyone? Albon with 46.

He arguably deserved another season, but on balance you cannot argue with it too much. It’s not like it was a decision to get rid of a young driver and replace them with one who brings big bucks in sponsorship. The fact that Hulkenberg was available, too, was a factor in Haas’s decision.

Magnussen/Hulkenberg does look a little stronger than Schumacher/Magnussen. Yes, Schumacher was inconsistent, but I don’t think he showed that his highs were high enough, nor were they frequent enough. The Aston Martin of Drugovich.

Fernando Alonso stepping into the car later on today. Drugovich now has 16 laps on the board, so Aston Martin are getting on with it a bit after missing a big chunk of time. 23 rounds.

It should have been 24 but the Chinese Grand Prix, scheduled to run in April, was binned. He is also the first man to do 40 laps, having just finished a 10-lap stint. Russell is starting his ninth lap in the Mercedes W14.

It’s within a second or so of Sainz’s fastest time and on the medium tyres. 28 laps for Russell so far. Nyck de Vries did compete in one race last year for Williams but is still a full-season rookie and will compete for AlphaTauri alongside Yuki Tsunoda.

Logan Sargeant lines up alongside Alexander Albon at Williams and Oscar Piastri is at McLaren. Who should we expect to do well? Piastri is the highest-rated of the three and goes into the fastest team. Lando Norris will be a very good benchmark and if he can score, say two-thirds or so of the points of the Englishman then he will have done well.

De Vries, I believe, has the potential to defeat Tsunoda, who needs a good year. Sargeant is a bit more of an unknown quantity, and driving in a problematic car (as the Williams was last year), can be a blessing and a curse. That leaves 2h15min on the clock for the first session of the day.

They finished seventh in last season’s constructors’ standings, but did so by doubling their points total at the half-way point with some impressive development. This year they have the addition of Fernando Alonso, which will surely help and significant investment in their Silverstone facilities. That said, Lance Stroll is missing this test after a bike crash and there has been a lack of laps so far today.

Plenty of time left, though, so it might not be a major worry. Felipe Drugovich is back on track in the AMR23. It included a fairly big lock-up.

A lot of acclimatisation for him this year, so makes sense to get him in early. His time of 1:38. 375 is five seconds slower than Sainz’s fastest of the day.

McLaren had a pretty rotten start to the season last year with brake issues hampering them in the first few rounds. It doesn’t seem like the (relative) lack of laps is related to any major issues. 0.

340sec faster than Verstappen. 23 laps for the Ferrari driver. With a 1:33.

593, 0. 078sec faster than Albon, but on the medium tyres. He now moves onto his 21st lap.

It was Hulkenberg who ran over the kerb in the second sector and lost some of his floor. He’s currently third with 20 laps on the board, 1. 116sec off Albon’s fastest time.

Again, there is a limited amount we can learn from the lap times in testing, especially in the first morning. But it’d be wrong not report on them. Which is good news.

Currently in the garage, though. Is it from Albon? Could be a bit of floor? Or from under the wing? Difficult to tell from from TV pictures from a far alone. On the soft tyres, he slips 0.

096sec ahead of Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari. It continues to be a difficult time for Williams, but 2022 was at least a season where they scored a handful of points, unlike the dire years of 2019 and 2020. Just Albon, Hulkenberg, Zhou and Gasly circulating at the moment.

The place you’re most likely to lock up on this track. Maybe equal with turn one. Read more from Tom Cary here.

It looks a bit like porpoising or bouncing if you view just a short clip of it but there is actually a fairly significant bump there. The Red Bull of Verstappen was really smashing into the ground there. A bit of deformation at the very front of the Ferrari nose on the start finish straight as well.

It is a slight indentation which then appears to pop back into place under braking. Is it intentional? The smiles in the Ferrari garage appear so suggest so, but it could be entirely unrelated. Need to have a look at it again.

. . The front nose looks slightly different to last year.

He has clocked up 17 laps so far as Zhou circulates in the handsome-looking Alfa Romeo. And Sainz goes fastest with a 1:33. 767.

the first man to drop below the 1:34 mark. Verstappen gets a bit snappy on the rear end on the throttle in the final corner. He will obviously go into the season as a the big favourite for the drivers’ title.

I cannot imagine that Red Bull will be too badly affected by the budget cap penalty which reduces their aero development this year. Certainly not enough to stop them from being title contenders. Depends what shape Ferrari and Mercedes are in, though.

Verstappen (RB), Gasly (Alpine), Russell (Mercedes) and Tsunoda (AT). It’s currently Verstappen, Gasly, Hulkenberg and Albon out on track. Biggest visual difference at the moment this year looks to be at the front of the car.

It’s probably in reality the floor around the sidepods but you cannot really see that clearly from the TV pictures. Meanwhile, Verstappen sets a new fastest lap of the day on the medium tyres: a 1:34. 985 .

For reference, last year’s pole lap was in the mid 1:30s and last year’s fastest race lap was in the mid 1:34s. 2019 was his last full season and that was with Renault. Since then he had three sub appearances for Racing Point (2020) and then a couple last year with Aston Martin at the start of the season.

The car they “launched” earlier this year was not in fact their 2023 car but a 2022 car made up in the 2023 livery. Which also happens to look very similar to last year’s. The session has now restarted! The red flag graphics have been removed and cars are lining up at the end of the pit lane but the Aston Martin has not yet returned to the pit lane and the green light at the end of it is yet to be turned on, as it were.

I keep getting the AlphaTauri confused with Alfa Romeo. Not because of the similarities in liveries of this year’s cars. .

. but because of the prominent Orlen branding and white nosecone of the AlphaTauri, which makes it look like last year’s Alfa Romeo. It’s mostly the red Orlen sponsorship, though.

The Aston Martin has been loaded onto the flatbed truck so hopefully not too much longer before we get going. Anyway, not an ideal start for the team. I’ll use it to update you on the lap count and order so far.

And the lap times. But you can basically ignore those at present. Looks like it’s the Aston Martin of Felipe Drugovich who barely gets a quarter away around the lap out of the pits.

Could well have been the team telling him to stop, having spotted something. Shouldn’t take long to get him back to the pits and get the session restarted. Just about four hours go to in this AM Session.

Four currently, but nine cars have currently done laps, Russell has done four. We are seeing the usual aero rakes on the cars as you would expect. George Russell’s Mercedes is the first car to leave the pit lane and F1 2023 is officially under way.

In a very low-key way. Red Bull: Verstappen Ferrari: Sainz (am)/Leclerc (pm) Mercedes: Russell (am)/Hamilton (pm) Alpine: Gasly (am)/Ocon (pm) McLaren: Piastri (am)/Norris (pm) Aston Martin: Drugovich (am)/Alonso (pm) Alfa Romeo: Zhou (am)/ Bottas (pm) Haas: Hulkenberg (am)/ Magnussen (pm) AlphaTauri: Tsunoda (am)/ De Vries (pm) Williams: Albon (am)/Sargeant (pm) So, only Red Bull not mixing and matching today. In fact, their plan is for Verstappen to get all of Thursday, Friday am and then for Perez to get Friday am and all of Saturday.

After a lengthy break, Formula One is back. In some ways it seems like a long time ago that the curtain fell on the season at Abu Dhabi, but in other ways it feels really long. Unlike last year, when the regulations changed significantly, this is the only test before the first grand prix of the year.

That runs on March 5 at the very same Bahrain track where this week’s three-day test takes place. Even though there are few changes to the regulations this year, testing is always a time of both worry and excitement for the teams and drivers. Who will be most excited? It’s hard to say.

There are a few teams who will feel deflated if they don’t experience an uptick in performance: notably Mercedes and Ferrari. Red Bull, in particular Max Verstappen was dominant last year, winning 17 races in total. Ferrari won four and Mercedes just one.

If there is to be hope of a competitive championship then those teams need to start off on the front foot. In fairness to Ferrari, they started last season on the front foot but then imploded through various errors. As ever, testing never gives a full picture of a team’s woes or joys but it does go some way to indicating how they start the season.

Hopefully we will have a clearer idea of how things are shaping up over the next three days. Meanwhile, in driver news, Formula Two champion Felipe Drugovich will drive for Aston Martin in place of the injured Lance Stroll when Formula One for the first test. Aston Martin said Tuesday that Drugovich will start testing in the morning session Thursday in Bahrain before Stroll’s team-mate Fernando Alonso takes over for the afternoon.

The schedule for Friday and Saturday was “to be confirmed,” the team added. Drugovich is one of two reserve drivers at Aston Martin, along with former McLaren driver Stoffel Vandoorne. The Brazilian-Italian driver won the F2 title last year and drove for Aston Martin in practice at the final race of the F1 season in Abu Dhabi in November.

The first session of the three-day test gets under way at 7am and we will be here for all of it, with lap times and latest updates. .