Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff says there is “a lot of damage” to deal with following Friday’s qualifying crashes in Austria.
Both Lewis Hamilton and team-mate George Russell had their Q3 sessions end in the barriers.
Hamilton lost control of his car through Turn 7 and skated through the gravel before hitting the wall at high speed. Minutes later, Russell spun at the final corner, backing the rear of his car into the wall.
“[There is] a lot of damage. I think we have two floors, two boxes that we need to check,” Wolff said.
“A rear wing, lots of little bits of pieces. In the garage in the early evening it looked like somebody dropped a Lego car on the floor. But the mechanics are doing great work.
“Both cars are pretty injured. The floors, we’ve done precautionary checks for the gearboxes, the rear wing for George, plenty of parts – that has cost cap implications.
“But the biggest is the mechanics working around the clock. We hope to have a good car for the sprint race to put us in a good position for tomorrow.”
Prior to the incidents, Mercedes looked to possess a strong car, having struggled for much of the 2022 season thus far.
But despite having a car with more pace compared to previous races after the introduction of upgrades, Wolff asserts the W13 is still difficult to drive.
“I think the car is still tricky to drive,” he said. “Now that we can actually fight for front positions, I am really happy to see that they are attacking.
“Lewis, the corner before, was carrying 10k more speed and made Turn 6, and then he carried 10k more speed into [Turn] 7 and didn’t make the corner.
“The same a little bit for George, he was up a little bit on his delta time and that was a particular strength of his previous runs and it went too far.
“Whether there was wind or any other conditions, I think the summary is the car is tricky to drive. But it’s faster now and for me that’s absolutely okay.”
