Underdog Mercedes has less manpower than rivals

Mercedes’ smaller staff numbers means the team will need to work harder to catch up its deficit to the frontrunners, boss Ross Brawn has admitted.

Amid the Briton’s management takeover in the wake of Honda’s departure at the end of 2008, Brawn GP shed hundreds of staff but still won last year’s title as its performance advantage diminished.

This year, Mercedes has taken over, but the Brackley based team remains lean, and this time Brawn is needing to ramp up its performance to catch the quickest Red Bulls and Ferraris.

“With 450 employees, it takes longer to implement certain development stages,” he told Germany’s Auto Motor und Sport.

“It would make no sense to take on 300 extra people,” said Brawn, referring to the F1 teams’ pledge to the FIA to reduce annual budgets to early 90s levels.

“We are already at the size that we need to be at the end of the year, while for our opponents that is yet to come,” he added.

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