With nothing to lose, Toto Wolff knows he can play the waiting game with Max Verstappen (2024)

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“Why on earth would you want to leave this team?”

Christian Horner is right. Max Verstappen is already on his march to a fourth world championship. His victory at the Chinese Grand Prix, the fourth from the four GPs he’s finished this season, was never in doubt. His average margin of victory this season has been 15.5 seconds.

With three-quarters of 2024 to go, it’s difficult to foresee a situation where Verstappen’s crown isn’t wrapped up with a handful of races to spare. Ferrari isn’t close enough yet to sustain a season-long challenge, nor is McLaren. Mercedes is far behind. In the other Red Bull, Sergio Pérez isn’t at Verstappen’s level, nor, unlike last year, does he seem to think he could put up a fight for the title.

Never have races felt like such foregone conclusions before they have started. Verstappen takes pole, Verstappen stays in the lead, Verstappen wins, and we try to get excited by the battle for second place. Rinse, repeat. It is as impressive as it is regrettable for those wishing for a more competitive F1.

Not a bad thing if you’re Max Verstappen, of course, who knows so long as Red Bull remains the dominant team, the wins and records will keep on coming. As he put it in Abu Dhabi last year after capping off his record-breaking season with a 19th victory: “Winning is great. Why would I not want to win?”

This brings us back to his team principal’s rhetorical question posed hours after the race in China: Why on earth would he want to leave?

In a driver market ‘silly season’ that was sent into a frenzy by Lewis Hamilton’s shock move to Ferrari for 2025, the pieces have just started to fall into place. So much of that revolves around whom Mercedes signs as Hamilton’s replacement for next year.

After the race in China, Mercedes’ team principal, Toto Wolff, again discussed the possibility of luring Verstappen away from Red Bull. He’d just seen his drivers limp home in sixth and ninth, continuing what has been a thoroughly miserable start to Mercedes’ year. At one stage, Hamilton reported on the radio that he was struggling to catch Esteban Ocon’s Alpine, hardly the kind of comparison you could use to sell your team to a driver of Verstappen’s caliber or success.

But Wolff said he did not think having the quickest car was the sole reason a driver would choose to stay with a team. “For simple minds, that might be the only reason you stay in a car, and that’s it,” Wolff said. “But maybe there is more depth to other people who consider other factors too, and I think Max has more depth.”

As Horner points out whenever this topic comes up, Verstappen has a contract in place at Red Bull running to 2028. When the deal was struck off the back of his maiden F1 title at the end of 2021, it stood as the longest agreement in F1 history and one of the most lucrative.

Horner, understandably, wasn’t impressed with Wolff’s comments. He pointed out Mercedes had lacked the pace of two of its engine customers, McLaren and Aston Martin, in China, and said Wolff’s time “would be better spent perhaps focusing on the team rather than the driver market.” The rivalry between the pair that burned brightest through 2021 has never been extinguished. It probably never will die out. Questions over Verstappen’s future are just the latest battleground, even if to Horner, there’s zero doubt where his star driver will race next year.

And that is true, so long as the peace of recent races can be maintained at Red Bull.

In Japan, off the back of Fernando Alonso’s assessment there was “zero chance” of Verstappen leaving, the Dutchman said he was “very happy where I’m at. And yeah, we want to keep it that way.” There’s the caveat: I need to be happy.

Through the early-season turbulence at Red Bull amid the investigation into Horner, who faced allegations of inappropriate behavior that he strenuously denied, and the ensuing power struggle, Verstappen stressed the need for a peaceful environment. That turbulence peaked when Red Bull adviser Helmut Marko’s position came into question; Verstappen indicated that without Marko, he would leave the team. The next day, after Marko had talks with Red Bull’s managing director, Oliver Mintzlaff, peace was restored.

Following the dismissal of the grievance against Horner, the Red Bull team boss said it was time for F1 to “move on” and draw a line under the matter. Given that the female complainant has since appealed the ruling, the topic will continue to bubble away in the background through the coming months. Any further flare-ups in the Red Bull power struggle, which has cooled considerably over the past three races, could risk breaking the peace Verstappen has always maintained he needs.

The fact Mercedes is in zero rush to make a decision works in Wolff’s favor. He’s always been clear that he wants time to assess how Mercedes’ protege Andrea Kimi Antonelli fares with his private F1 testing program — which started last week in Austria — and through F2 this year. The longer that assessment takes, the longer the door stays open in the event Verstappen seriously pursues an exit from Red Bull.

There’s not a lot for Mercedes to lose in this. Unless it fears missing out on a shorter-term option, such as Carlos Sainz, who really cannot make a much stronger case for a seat anywhere right now, then it can afford to take its time.

Whomever it chooses can expect a tricky 2025, given Mercedes’ continued struggles under these regulations. Not until 2026, when the new rules are introduced, will there be the chance to realistically fight for a championship again. But should Mercedes steal a march with its engines as it did at the start of the V6 hybrid era in 2014, which started its record streak of eighth constructors’ titles, it could be the team to be at once again.

It’s all about timing. And until Mercedes pulls the trigger on a decision, expect this ‘softly softly’ pursuit of Verstappen — and the continued back-and-forth between Wolff and Horner — to continue.

Another subplot in a silly season that has already proved anything is possible.

(Lead photo of Toto Wolff: Bryn Lennon – Formula 1/Formula 1 via Getty Images)