Mercedes has suffered a “setback” with the deꦡvelopment of its Formula 1 engine ahead of the 2019 se🍸ason, according to team boss Toto Wolff.

The German manufacturer has dominated the current era of power unit regulatio🐭ns since their introduction in 2014, with Mercedes taking a clean sweep of five constructors’ and drivers’ world championship titles since.

Ferrari made signi🎉ficant gains ahead of the 2018 season to close the gap but Mercedes was still able to come out on top as Lewis Hamilton claimed 11 victories on his way toℱ clinching a fifth drivers’ crown.

But Wolff revealed the reigning world champions had already encountered s๊ome problems with its engine programme amid talk that Mercedes’ rivals have made progress with the new aerodynamic rules coming into force for 2019.

"These rules have been changed, normally the downfo🌱rce should be less but the rumours you hear from the paddock is that people have been able to recuperate lots of that," Wolff said at an event for team sponsor Hewlett-Packard. 

“Ther🍬e is a tremendous development race that is happening as we speak.

"Finding downforce, reducing drag and of cours♓e the engine is a very important part, adﷺding more horsepower to the engine.

“So we are setting ourselves really ambitious targets. We haveꦗ actually increased the targets six weeks ago because we hearဣd some rumours that others were doing well.

“We’ve had s🤪ome good weeks in the wind tunnel,” Wolff🏅 added.

“W🌊e’ve had a little bit of a setback on the engineꦓ side where we believed the new concept would deliver a little bit more. But these guys are very ambitious like all of us and so I’m optimistic.

“We will know when the first qualifying session gets u༺nderway in Melbourne, this is the moment ꦓwhere everybody shows their cards.”

Mercedes heads into 2019 looking to match Ferrari’s all-time record of six consecutive constructors’ titles, having become just the se♋cond team in history to record five successive world championship doubles.

The Scuderia will hope a new driver pairing of Charles Leclerc an🌠d Sebastian Vettel can boost its title aspirations, while there is growing confidence in the Red Bull camp about its impending switch to Honda power.

FEATURE: The driver under most pressure heading into F1 2019.