Mercedes rue 'barn door' set-up error

Mercedes Team Principal Toto Wolff has revealed the team will investigate the difference in rear wings used by George Russell and Lewis Hamilton in Belgian Grand Prix Qualifying.

Russell opted for a higher-downforce specification wing whereas Hamilton elected for the low-downforce example, with both drivers now locked into their respective specifications after parc fermé conditions were enforced.

Hamilton was able to secure fourth in qualifying but will be promoted to third once Max Verstappen's grid penalty is applied, while Russell was only eighth - nearly 0.800secs down on his seven-time champion seven-time teammate.

Mercedes' rear-wings

"They ran very different rear wing configurations, and you can see that Lewis is just able to extract more performance from it," Wolff told Sky Sports F1.

"[George] has a bit of a barn door on the back, and that can be advantageous for tyre performance on Sunday.

"But it didn't help [in qualifying] so we need to assess why it didn't.

"P3 [on the grid] is good, and you can see that is is pretty bunched up (with less than a second separating Charles Leclerc in second and Lance Stroll in 10th).

"We couldn't properly assess if our [new] parts are working because of the tricky conditions, so let's hope for a dry Saturday and Sunday."