Toto Wolff to Miss Suzuka Race Amid Mercedes' Drivers Rumours
Mar.27 - Fans of Toto Wolff should not look for the Mercedes team boss and co-owner at Suzuka.
"It's true, I won't be in Japan," the Austrian confirmed. "(Communications boss) Bradley Lord will be standing in for me there.
"He chooses his words more carefully than I do anyway."
In the past few years, as the calendar swelled, Wolff has sat out one or two of the longer-haul races. But it's a very busy time for the Austrian - in a close fight with the other three major teams, and already tackling questions about the driver lineup for 2026.
His 18-year-old protege Kimi Antonelli replaced Lewis Hamilton this year and has impressed so far, but even more impressive has been his experienced teammate George Russell, whose quiet consistency means he's only a single point behind Max Verstappen's P2 in the drivers' standings.
Still, 27-year-old Russell's contract runs out at the end of the year. Wolff seems very happy with Mercedes' senior driver.
"I've always said that he's one of the top drivers out there," Wolff said. "If you want me to name three that I consider the top drivers, he's absolutely in those three, if not the top two, and maybe on his way to the top one."
However, he was quite coy in Shanghai when asked if he would snap up Max Verstappen if the opportunity to sign him suddenly arose for 2026.
"Toto Wolff was very passive, you'd have to say," former F1 driver Ralf Schumacher told Sky Deutschland. "And when someone like that is calm, you can clearly tell that something is already going on in the background.
"For him, it's a luxury problem. The question, of course, is what does he do? Because he has two drivers who are close to his heart. George Russell, who is currently fighting for his future, which is very clear - you can really tell.
"And also Kimi Antonelli, who he thinks highly of," Schumacher added.
For now, Wolff's bigger focus might be on closing the gap to McLaren and charging for the current championship.
"We are not yet where we want to be," he said. "We will only be satisfied when we are winning races again and fighting for championships.
"But you can make up two tenths, even three tenths. I wouldn't say we're really in the title race yet, but we're not far behind."
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Suzuka isn't even the most distant flyaway GP location relative to Europe, yet he mostly chooses the Japanese GP as a particular event not to attend rather than, for example, the Australian GP as the most distant one to Europe by quite a margin.
Additionally, Suzuka is an absolute classic with a great atmosphere, so I don't know what he has against that location & the same with Martin Brundle who hasn't attended the Japanese GP ever since 2018, iirc., although Baku is also a location he tends to avoid, for that matter.
Easy for me to point out, but if anything, I'd attend the Japanese GP every single season if I were in a favorable position to do so, even if that were the only round for me to attend or at least the only flyaway round.
Max wont have signed for Merc this early so it isnt that, Torgers looking tired these days, i think his interest is waning, you can just as easily start a rumour he was with the Mercedes board about selling his 33% back to them
Not much chance of that in the present climate with Trump.
A good business man knows how and when to get out, Torgers no different
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