Winning races in 2012 is a little ‘too optimistic’ for Mercedes, that’s the view of the outfit’s team principal Ross Brawn who was probed on the teams chances for 2012.
Speculation in the German media suggested Mercedes showed good long-run pace during testing, going as far as suggesting the team could be ahead of Red Bull – but this isn’t a widely held belief in the paddock and Brawn agrees.
“I think that is a bit too optimistic,” he said when asked if the team are in a position to win the Australian GP.
“I believe we have moved quite a long way in 12 months and we are much stronger team than we were 12 months ago. I wasn’t comfortable at all with where we were 12 months ago,” he added.
The 57-year-old says the team are in a much better place than in 2011 and the full extent of their pace won’t be known until at least after the Bahrain GP in late April.
“We won’t know until the first four races really where everybody sits. Melbourne can be a bit unusual, especially now it is an evening race tyre pressures and temperatures can be a little bit of an issue.
“We certainly have a much better platform, the things that we have been building over the last 12 to 18 months are starting to come to fruition.”
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