Mercedes team principal and CEO Toto Wolff recently revealed that the last few moments of the 2021 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix were when he fell out of love with F1. Towards the end of the season finale, Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen raced to the finish line to secure the championship title.
Former racing director Michael Masi, however, made a call to essentially hand the win to the Dutchman, although Hamilton led the majority of the race. Wolff described this rather unjust decision as “incomprehensible,” especially since Mercedes’ protests against the final result were overruled in the end.
In a new interview with The Times, the Austrian said:
“At the end of the race, an individual took decisions that were not reflected anywhere in the rule book and were so drastic that they made the outcome unbelievable. That is a moment when you fall out of love with the sport… The principle of fairness was breached.”
Speaking about Michael Masi’s eventual departure from the sport as racing director after the season, he added:
“The FIA took the guy out of the job because it was a human error… But it’s done and dusted now. I still think about it a lot, but not with anger. It is just incomprehensible how it came about.”
Mercedes team boss moves the family to Monaco from the UK for safety reasons
Toto Wolff revealed that he decided to move his family from Oxford, near the Mercedes base in Brackley, UK, to Monaco after facing a “security issue”. Additionally, he said he has the intention of sending his son to an “international school”. Several F1 drivers, including Daniel Ricciardo, Lando Norris, Charles Leclerc, and Lewis Hamilton also currently reside in Monaco.
In an interview with The Times, the Mercedes boss said:
“We moved to Monaco because we had a security issue in the UK and also because we wanted to educate our son in an international school.”
“I live in Oxford during the week and travel back at weekends. I like being in Oxford and I like working. I tend to stay in the office until 8pm, then go to the gym in the evening, have dinner, read a book and go to bed.”
Toto Wolff has three children and married former professional racing driver and Venturi Racing CEO Susie Wolff back in 2011.
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