Toto Wolff is focused on improving the car rather than Max Verstappen, as he adds on Esteban Ocon situation plus Christian Horner reacts.
Ever since the news broke about Lewis Hamilton leaving Mercedes for the 2025 F1 season, the rumour about the second seat has been hot with several names linked. Amid all those, Verstappen has been talked about a lot as well despite his long-term deal with Red Bull.
With all the internal shenanigans ongoing at Red Bull, it gave further fuel to the stories with Wolff pushing on the agenda too. But things have slowed down as Andrea Kimi Antonelli’s name remains on top after Carlos Sainz’s apparent dropout from it.
At the moment, Wolff is focused on improving the Mercedes car rather than hold discussions with the Verstappen camp – which he clarifies is not taking place. “We need to just continue to improve and look at ourselves, most importantly, as a team with our drivers, Lewis and George, we’ve just got to get better and hopefully consolidate our ability to get on the podium and at a certain stage, be able to win races on our own, and good drivers will want to come,” he said to media.
“No, there’s no talks that are taking place at this stage. Because I think we need to look on ourselves and on improving the car. And no driver decision has been made. I said, we want to keep this decision as long as possible, because who knows what happens what happens,” summed up Wolff, who also clarified that nothing on Antonelli is firm yet too.
There is another name who is linked with Wolff but hasn’t popped his name for the running at Mercedes. Having decided to part ways with Alpine at the end of F1 2024, Ocon remains a free agent as of now, with heavy links to the Haas seat.
Wolff is managing Ocon alongwith Mercedes junior programme head Gwen Lagrue. “We are still Esteban’s manager,” said the Mercedes F1 boss to ORF. “With our junior coordinator, Gwen, we try to do that as well as possible. That’s why we are indirectly involved in where he goes.
“Yes, that’s [Haas] one of the possibilities. I don’t see that [Ocon joining Mercedes] at the moment. But that’s why we want to take our time with the decision, so that we simply have this seat open, whatever happens,” summed up Wolff.
Meanwhile, when put forward the question to Red Bull chief Horner about Wolff potentially ruling out taking in Verstappen, the Brit was amused that the topic was still on. “Max is going to be here next year, which is…is Toto still talking about it? And what did he say? He said there were no talks? So they’re talking but they’re not talking? OK,” noted Horner.
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