'There are no easy wins', admits Mercedes boss Toto Wolff

©Mercedes

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff was delighted by the team's unexpected victory in Singapore, but says that they can't afford to let up for a single minute in the remaining six races of 2018.

"We showed an excellent performance in Singapore and the victory was a fantastic reward for all the hard work that had gone into it," he said this week ahead of the Russian Grand Prix.

"But it also reinforced another point: there are no easy wins this season.

"We have to fight hard for every bit of performance in order to have a chance to fight for victories," he emphasised. "This fight will continue in Russia.

Last year, Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton started from the second row of the grid behind the two Ferrari entries. Bottas went on to seal victory for the Silver Arrows with a brilliant opportunistic drive on race day.

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"We have a good track record in Sochi," said Wolff. "But we know that Ferrari and Red Bull will give it everything to break our winning streak.

"We must fight as hard as ever to make sure we bring home as many points as possible."

Currently Hamilton holds a 40 point lead in the drivers championship while Mercedes has 37 points in hand over Ferrari in the constructors standings.

Hamilton himself has two wins in Russia to his name. The most recent was back in 2015, meaning that this has not been one of his happier hunting grounds in recent times.

However, 2015 was the last time the race was held later in the season after the summer break, and the change in race date could well prove significant.

"With the race being held in late September, we're going back to weather conditions that will be similar to those of 2014 and 2015 when the Russian Grand Prix took place in early October," said Wolff.

"We don't have any data from the current regulation cars in those conditions in Sochi, so this adds another challenge to the race."

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.