Mercedes have been making quite a few mistakes during the 2021 season. At the last race, it was strategy where they failed to match their championship rivals Red Bull. Nico Rosberg, who was once a Mercedes driver and won the 2016 championship with them, didn’t hold back while analyzing the performance of Mercedes and their drivers Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton in France Link to poll: https://www.youtube.com/post/Ugw7IEeaddGT6OqySJx4AaABCQ 0:00 - Nico Rosberg Highly Critical Of Mercedes’ Mistakes 1:54 - Fast Feed I'm your host Dillon Shelley and first up on Formula World: Nico Rosberg Highly Critical Of Mercedes’ Mistakes Rosberg began by explaining how the strategy call for Valtteri Bottas was the right one and how it was Bottas who let the team down “As a driver, you can’t judge the situation out there so the team obviously has to make a decision [on strategy]. It was the right decision [on Bottas] because they had to keep him out there to protect the win – it’s just that Valtteri did a rubbish job, honestly, in defending” He further explained how Bottas should have been smarter with his defense “He blocked completely unnecessarily, he braked way too late, went straight on, so Max had such an easy time getting past. Maybe he would have got past anyway, but [you should] at least cost him a bit more lap time. It was not a very good way of defending” He also felt that Lewis Hamilton’s approach to defending his lead was meek “I thought it was a bit soft from Lewis. Normally Lewis is the best in one-on-one duels, so I'm surprised he didn't try to defend, brake late and then let Max at least try to pass on the outside. I thought it was unusual for Lewis. Just throw that door shut!” He then suggested that Mercedes are under pressure now and explained why “You can definitely see the pressure on Mercedes. They are still a phenomenal team, but the speed of Red Bull... They are starting to become more and more the dominating force, putting pressure on Mercedes so they are making mistakes” He signed off by reiterating that Mercedes can’t afford to keep making mistakes “They have to be careful and can't afford any more mistakes to have a chance this season” Fast Feed Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton has explained that “there’s marbles on the inside, so [he] didn’t want to make [his] tyres any worse than they already were” while defending his lead against Max He added that Max “had the DRS open, so if he didn’t pass me there, he would have passed me the straight afterwards, so it would have made zero difference” He further suggested that if Max “had not made a mistake in Turn 1 [on the first lap], they would have just led the race all the way, probably” Lewis, also, didn’t find the defeat “gut-wrenching at all. It just didn’t work out but [he is] not massively disappointed” He thinks Mercedes “did the best job [they] could today and, of course there were things [they] could have done slightly better” “But overall [Red Bull] have been quicker than [them] all weekend so it’s a true reflection of the pace they have” His team principal Toto Wolff surmised that with the strategy they “gambled; [they] lost” Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettel has suggested that “it was only a couple of laps that [they] were missing in the end” “Otherwise [they] could have had a battle on [their] hands for maybe more points… it was very close to catch that group up to P6 in the end” F1’s managing director Ross Brawn feels that “it’s clear Mercedes were caught out by the potency of the undercut” “Clearly what played out in the race didn’t match the numbers. That was the surprise” “What Lewis demonstrated was his ability to bring more out of tyres in difficult circumstances compared with Valtteri, who obviously took more life out of the tyres” Brawn reasoned He also found it surprising “to see Ferrari struggle after their performances in the last two Grands Prix” “Their speed in qualifying was decent and [he] honestly [doesn’t] know where that went in the race” He further suggested that “they will have to go away and work out what they got wrong as it is out of kilter with their recent performance” For Alpine’s Fernando Alonso, race starts have “been [his] strongest point for 20 years, so why not still now?!” “The starts are that moment in the race that you need to improvise a little bit, you need to be creative, there is no tyre performance, there is no car performance” “It’s just yourself and your instinct, so [he’s] enjoying those kind of laps. Always the first lap has been a strong point and now [he’s] more comfortable with the car, with the start procedures” He pointed out that “in Baku [they] were in Q3 and finished P6, in Paul Ricard [they] were in Q3, finished P8, so [he thinks they] are getting better and better and [he’s] happy” Will Ferrari be back on the pace again in Austria?