Toto Wolff: 2022 F1 Abu Dhabi GP was a 'precise summary of the season' for Mercedes

Toto Wolff, along with the entire Mercedes personnel, was dissatisfied with the team's performance in Abu Dhabi, the final race of the season. The same was the team's reaction to most of the races throughout the 2022 season.

Wolff feels that the pace of their cars was too less to be competitive with the Red Bulls and Ferraris. Since their Abu Dhabi performance was similar to many other races this season, Toto called the race at the Yas Marina Circuit a 'precise summary of the season'. Wolff told Sky Sports:

"All the mistakes you can make, a car that was not at the pace it should have been. Third quickest today – one car breaking down and the other one running out of tyres. It was a precise summary of the season, and here we are."

Despite the amazing performance in Brazil, Mercedes struggled for pace throughout the weekend in Abu Dhabi. They were only the third fastest (as Wolff said) during the qualifying session as well.

Both drivers started at P5 and P6, but the race did not end well as Lewis Hamilton had to retire his car on the 56th lap following gearshift issues. This resulted in the team losing huge points to Ferrari, who were their main competitor in the standings during the season.

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Mercedes reveal: "We knew that Abu Dhabi was going to be a difficult one for the car, so at least the correlation is good"

After George Russell scored his maiden Formula 1 victory in Brazil, hopes were high for Mercedes fans. However, as Toto Wolff revealed, the team was already aware that the car would not be performing too well at the Yas Marina circuit. This is one of the steps in understanding the car, but it was a bit too late into the season to realize that. Wolff said:

"We knew that Abu Dhabi was going to be a difficult one for the car, so at least the correlation is good."

Toto believes that the tire degradation was too high initially during the race when they were attacking to get ahead of the field. However, with Hamiton's incident with Carlos Sainz on the chicane of turns six and seven on the opening lap, the Briton lost a great amount of time because he had to let Sainz pass him.

While the attack initially in the race did not help them, it did degrade their medium tires and then they started losing time. Toto Wolff stated:

"I think we cooked the tyres in the first few laps. We attacked strongly, the car seemed to be really good and then the front right just gave up. Maybe that’s something we should have predicted, but that is the consequence."

While Russell was pitted twice, Hamilton was left out to keep the track position. However, that did not turn out well for him as he started to lose time due to an apparent "power issue," as he called on the team radio. Soon, he lost a huge amount of time to Sainz behind him and ultimately had to retire the car due to gearshift issues.

Mercedes lost their constructors' battle against Ferrari, which they were hoping to win in Abu Dhabi. The 2022 season ended with Mercedes having 515 points in their bag and Ferrari with the upper hand on them with 554 points.

This was the first time that Mercedes did not win the constructors' championship since 2014 and also their lowest finishing place since. This also marked Lewis Hamilton's first ever F1 season since his debut (2007) where he neither scored a pole position nor a race win. The team suffered a great loss but is set to come back strongly for the upcoming season, as officials stated.