'100% on us' - Mercedes shoulders blame for George Russell's Spa GP heartbreak

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff absolved George Russell of any blame for his lap one retirement at the Belgian Grand Prix, explaining that yet another reliability issue had begun his troubles.

Ahead of the weekend, Wolff said that Mercedes needed to ensure it 'turned pace into results', after a string of reliability problems across both cars had allowed Ferrari to sneak back into championship contention.

But the gremlins were evident once more at Spa-Francorchamps, with Russell voicing his frustration after qualifying, before another battery issue left him with limited power on the Kemmel Straight on lap one, and ultimately saw him turned into the gravel by former team-mate Lewis Hamilton.

"It's two situations here," Wolff told Sky Sports F1. 

"First is the racing, the accident that happened. It was unfortunate for us, we lost a lot of constructors' points and George [lost] drivers' points. And then we had an issue with all Mercedes engines, where we lacked power on the straight. And that bit him badly. It 100% goes on us."

Facing the wider media, Wolff added: “The impact was that he had more energy available at the beginning of the lap, and then less energy at the end of the lap. But in terms of optimisation, it was a deficit. And we believe that the deficit was about two, two and a half tenths in qualifying modes, much less than on the long runs.”

Confirming the problem to be "different" to anything seen before, Wolff was asked how fans can be expected to understand the complicated power units, when teams with all the knowledge appear to be struggling. 

“The power unit is so complex in the way you harvest, the way you deploy, the interaction from the driver," he answered. 

"We have a super-strong package, championship-winning chassis and power unit, but we're still trying to give it our best to fix the reliability issue. 

“Sometimes in a new regulation, that happens. 

“With George, over the weekend, there was definitely something on the engine that we have identified that meant he had less energy to deploy into turn 18, that was the most visible [issue]. 

“It's good that we spotted it here, because in Budapest, which is not energy-starved, it would have been more difficult to identify. But it still doesn't make it better for him, and that probably accounted for half the gap, or a little bit more, that he had to Kimi."