Helmut Marko has shared his understanding that the mood in the Mercedes camp is "tense" following the departure of some key staff.
The Silver Arrows will certainly be losing at least one important member of their team, when James Vowles leaves. The long-serving strategy chief officially starts his new job as team principal of the Williams team on February 20.
Any comments made by Marko on the situation at Mercedes certainly need to be taken with a pinch of salt, given his many years of service to their Red Bull rivals. But the Austrian believes several other staff members will be leaving with Vowles, and that it has caused some "tension".
Asked about the feeling that Williams are becoming something of a Mercedes B-team, Marko told Sport1.de that he has "completely different information". He said: "Vowles went of his own accord and – so it is said – even takes good engineers with him. My sources tell me that's why the mood at Mercedes is so tense."
In spite of any unrest behind the scenes at Mercedes, Marko still expects the Silver Arrows to be the main threat to Red Bull this year. "I still believe that Mercedes will be our biggest challenger when it comes to defending our title," he added.
Any tension that does exist at Mercedes is understandable, given the poor season they had last year. They will be desperate to start the upcoming campaign on much more solid ground, and will have to wait to see how their car compares to their rivals.
While they have been keen to manage expectations, both team principal Toto Wolff and driver George Russell have publicly declared their faith in the team to steady the ship. "We haven't suddenly taken a stupid pill, winning the constructors' championship last December and then in March being nowhere is very easy. We got the concept [of the W13] wrong," Wolff said in December.
"In the organisation nobody is shy to say that we've done a bad job here. Very easy. There is no hiding, no seeking for explanation how we ended up there. I mean, all of us are saying we got this very wrong and others got it very right."
And Russell later added: "[Staff] haven't forgotten how to build a fast race car We just got it wrong... Now, I feel we've dug ourselves out of that hole and we're building on top of that. We are a step behind Red Bull and Ferrari and we've got a lot of catching up to do – but we're definitely going to be in a much stronger position from race one."
