Mercedes have explained their pit stop plan for Lewis Hamilton at the Monaco Grand Prix which led to complaints from the seven-time F1 champion.
Hamilton pitted when he had enough room behind him to not lose any places. And a lap later Max Verstappen, who was one place ahead on track, followed suit and came back out ahead of the Briton, who was not pleased.
He took to the radio to question why he had not been informed of Verstappen's tyre change, hinting he could have pushed harder to try to undercut the Red Bull racer. Afterwards, team principal Toto Wolff admitted they made a mistake by not doing so.
The Austrian said: "That was a miscommunication first between us on the pit wall. We got that wrong, it should have been an 'out-lap critical' in trying to undercut. But then there was a debate whether any out-lap would be enough on the new tyre, so the message he got was at best confusing, but probably wrong.
"It should have been an 'out-lap critical'. The worry in the background was if we stretched the tyre in a single lap then what would happen later? But in summary it was the wrong message to Lewis, and this is a team sport."
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In a new video published by the team, Mercedes trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin addressed the matter and also admitted they "could have been a bit tidier". He is of the opinion, though, that Hamilton would not have undercut Verstappen even if he had put his foot down.
Shovlin said: "We never thought we would be able to undercut Max, because the reality is if we stopped because there was no one behind us and we had clear track, they are not going to stop if they do not have the window to drop out ahead of us. What we thought we would have ended up with was Lewis then catching up to Max, who does not stop. Max is on a used set of tyres; Lewis is on a new set of tyres, and he can put Max under pressure.
"We did not think it would really change the race situation, but in the unlikely event that George [Russell] was struggling to make the finish, it did give us a little bit of an insurance policy. The bit that did not go well was because we did not tell Lewis to go flat out on that out lap, Max actually had the gap to make the pit stop, so he was able to, because he was not going as fast as he could to start with, he could push up behind George.
"He gained time against himself because he was managing. He was able to do that stop, get out in front. What we inadvertently ended up with was Max on a new set behind George, which was not ideal, but as you saw, it did not really look like George was at risk of losing that position. He had managed the tyres well and he had good rubber at the end.
"We could have been a bit tidier, and we could have been a bit clearer with that messaging. But what would have happened is we would have just had Lewis on fresh rubber, still able to get that fastest lap, which was one of the considerations why we wanted to do that and be able to put a bit of pressure on Max."
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