Toto Wolff witnessed an impressive response from Mercedes' engineers at the team's post-race debrief in Sepang as the German squad tackles its performance slump.
Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton increased their advantage over Ferrari and Sebastia Vettel thanks to the latter's reliability woes, but the relative under-performance of its W08 has left the team with more questions than answers.
A comprehensive and lengthy debrief conducted after the race left Wolff with the belief that no stone will be left unturned until Mercedes' engineers get to the bottom of the problem affecting their car's performance.
"It is these moments that make you progress and I had the best race debrief in five years right now," he said.
"This is the feeling I have because it is just so painful.
"We benefited in the championship from the misfortune of Ferrari, but we didn't have the pace to challenge either Red Bull or Ferrari, and this is what remains the underlying feeling with all of us.
"We need to understand why we underperform on certain circuits and certain ambient conditions.
"Full credit to Red Bull and Ferrari for their performance, but I think we have underperformed in Singapore and we have underperformed in Kuala Lumpur," he said.
"This is what we need to concentrate on."
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