Wolff: W13 going to the caves not Mercedes museum

After their double podium in Hungary, Mercedes came to the 2022 Belgian Grand Prix weekend filled with hope of another strong performance, also introducing an upgrade package for the W13.

But as things turned out, the Silver Arrows were over 1.8s off the pace of the fastest qualifying times set by Max Verstappen, with their best qualifying seven-time Formula 1 Champion Lewis Hamilton who was seventh.

"We came here and we were very optimistic that we would be able to be close - half a second," Hamilton told Sky Sports F1. "To be 1.8 seconds behind is a real kick in the teeth but it is what it is.

"It's a car that we continue to struggle with and I definitely won't miss it at the end of the year," he admitted.

"For me, it's just about focusing on how we design and build next year's car," the Briton said with a hint of throwing in the towel.

"The two teams ahead of us are in a different league and our car looks so much different to theirs so we've got a lot of work to do. We'll do the best we can for the rest of the season," Hamilton said.

After the race, where Hamilton retired after a clumsy tangle with Alpine's Fernando Alonso, while George Russell went on to finish fourth, almost half a minute away from race winner Max Verstappen.

Toto Wolff was clearly dissatisfied with his team's performance in Spa, where Verstappen "leaped above" everyone, and when asked about Hamilton's sentiments towards his 2022 ride, he seemed to be of the same opinion.

"We are in a situation where the championship will be concluded in Europe probably and that car will not... I don't think it's going to have the highest place in the Mercedes Benz Museum in Stuttgart.

"Maybe going to go a little bit in the caves," the Mercedes boss revealed.

"It's very difficult to cope with these swings," Wolff said on Sunday of the W13's fluctuating performance. "We had a totally subpar performance yesterday; fighting you know being beaten by the Alpines, Albon very strong. Valtteri would have been right there. Norris probably too.

"And then in the race at times we go three seconds a lap faster," he revealed. "Big question marks about what's going on. It is not where we should be with the structure and the knowledge to understand the racing car but we don't with this one.

"It's a very difficult situation because we obviously have a certain concept of a car," Wolff continued. "And it's not like we can experiment a lot this year and just simply dial stuff out and test. Whatever we decide for next year, needs to be carefully evaluated.

"Clearly our data don't give us the results, don't correlate with the reality. We have massive swings in performance that we can't really get on top of.

"To take a decision for next year, whatever it may be, in this very moment you know... changing the concept dramatically, how can you be sure that that's the better direction to go because clearly we'll be starting a little bit way back.

"Now, that is going to be part of the decisions, because the discussions we had already, the decisions in the upcoming few weeks of what we want to do about it," Wolff said.

Asked whether the focus will now be on the 2023 car, regardless of a concept changes, Wolff said: "I think we still have the ambition to win races this year.

"If I would have told you that in Budapest, you would have said, well, that's pretty possible. Today saying that I look like a fool. But there are some racetracks that will suit our car much more than now.

"Hopefully, we'll get it right on Saturday. So that is the ambition whilst at the same time giving it a big focus on to next year, it's clear.

"The positions are where they are, at least between the top three teams it is what it is. Finishing second or third makes no difference to me. Nevertheless, I want to have the best possible race result every single weekend in order to gain confidence in what we do," the 50-year-old concluded.

(Additional reporting by Agnes Carlier)