Mercedes "hanging on for dear life" with PU demands - Toto Wolff

United States Grand Prix

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Mercedes "hanging on for dear life" with PU demands - Wolff

Three Mercedes powered drivers revealed engine penalties on Friday in the US

Sam Hall & Ian Parkes

Saturday 23 October 2021 08:00

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Mercedes is "hanging on for dear life" according to team principal Toto Wolff as it fights to overcome the reliability issues that continue to plague its power unit.

For the fourth consecutive race, Mercedes face grid penalties as Valtteri Bottas has taken a sixth internal combustion engine [ICE] which means he will drop five places for the United States Grand Prix.

But Mercedes also has to take care of its customers, with Aston Martin's Sebastian Vettel and Williams' George Russell dropping to the back of the grid this weekend for taking on a new ICE, turbocharger and MGU-H.

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They follow McLaren's Daniel Ricciardo who suffered the same fate for the last race in Turkey.

Addressing the overall picture in trying to get through the rest of the season with PU supply, Wolff said: "You see we are suffering with reliability this year. We are going onto the sixth engine for Valtteri.

"It is not something we choose to do but on the contrary, we are really trying to get on top of the problems and we haven’t understood it fully.

“We are a step closer now so it is not always we are easy with having the engines. We are hanging on for dear life in supplying all the customers and that is not trivial.”

With the championship battle between Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen finely poised with six points separating the pair, Wolff warned Mercedes could "pre-empt" a DNF and take a penalty with Hamilton in the closing races.

“Over the last seven or eight years, that mindset has won us races and championships," added Wolff.

“I would have hoped to maybe have fewer penalties and have used fewer engines but this year it has really hit us hard.”