Next round in the exchange of blows between Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff and Red Bull team boss Christian Horner: The issue is still the staff turnover between the teams. According to a blunt statement by Horner, 220 employees from Mercedes AMG High Performance Power Trains are said to have moved to Red Bull Power Trains.
Wolff didn’t want to take this lying down and recently countered with another dig: “He needs to work on his mathematical skills. There were 19 engineers.” The Mercedes boss didn’t want to make such a big deal out of the whole issue anyway. “Whatever these numbers are, I think there is a natural fluctuation between the teams. Employees come and go, which is completely normal,” Wolff reassured.
Wolff: Mercedes engine has been the benchmark in Formula 1 since 2014
The Austrian also exuded calmness and team confidence in relation to future engine development at Mercedes: “I think we have an engine department that is as good as it can be with first-class management. There is not a millimetre at HPP that I would want to be different – neither in terms of the organisation nor in terms of the people I am lucky enough to work with there. It is simply a perfect organisation. You can see that they simply deliver and have been doing so for a long time.”
Mercedes experienced the beginning of the Ground Effect era crashed in 2022 and had the worst start to the season in years in 2024. How long will Toto Wolff be safely in the boss’s chair before he and the team have to draw the consequences from the desolate performance? We discuss this in this video:
“Since 2014, we have pretty much been the measure of all things, or perhaps the benchmark with a different engine. That hasn’t changed,” added Wolff. He is looking forward to the future of Formula 1 with new engine regulations: “I can’t wait for 2026 to come and for us to see the different performance levels of the power units.”
It’s not just the engineers and mechanics job market that’s busy. Max Verstappen was also linked with a departure from the Austrian racing team for several weeks. Toto Wolff welcomed this, which once again enmeshed him in a feud with Horner. All about it here: