“You’ve got a problem, change your f***ing car”, said Christian Horner on the Netflix Docuseries Drive to Survive. These words seem to be engraved in F1 fans’ minds. This epic scene took Toto Wolff and Horner’s rivalry to a whole different level. However, Guenther Steiner suggests that it was just just a stunt for the camera.
“In that meeting, it was a little bit, like “What’s going on here? This is not normal”. They were not told to do it but they took it into their own hands. They saw an opportunity”, said Guenther Steiner in Autosport’s YouTube video. Although the former TP hesitated to confirm it, it can be seen in his eyes and gestures that he believed it looked exaggerated.
Toto Wolff: “Horner said that he (Max) will stay. Lets see, we leave him with this idea”
“We’ll see if the W15 will be a car that can convince Max”
“It’s Max who wins the races and not Red Bull. The RB20 is solid, but Perez isn’t doing well”
“Its Max who makes the difference” pic.twitter.com/g5SoEtdk14
— Verstappen News (@verstappenews) June 25, 2024
Mercedes was struggling massively with porpoising in 2022 as Red Bull became the leader. What made matters worse was the fact that Lewis Hamilton just lost the 2021 championship to Max Verstappen in a controversial final race. Hence, the scene with Wolff complaining about proposing seemed like a natural outburst.
Wolff suggests and retaliates against Horner’s comments by suggesting that his driver Perez also having trouble with porpoising just made it that much bigger. The scene was all over the social media. It became big to the point where whenever a team’s performance is subpar, Horner’s ‘change the car’ comments are used as a meme.
Regardless, even if it was staged, it added yet another important moment in the Horner-Wolff rivalry. Even since this moment, the rivalry only seems to have intensified despite Hamilton being nowhere near Verstappen’s pace in recent times.
The Iconic Team Principal Rivalry: Toto Wolff and Christian Horner
Christian Horner and Toto Wolff have been nagging each other even since the Mercedes Boss joined the team back in the mid-2010s. Mercedes were winning everything and Red Bull didn’t even come close to any championship.
Horner in an interview revealed how it hurts when your team isn’t winning. They went through the same during Mercedes’ domination and now Wolff is going through that with Red Bull dominating. With both Wolff and Horner being super vocal and TPs of a big team, it gave a good backstory to their rivalry.
The rivals intensified during the 2021 season when the two teams actually went head to head for a championship and were super close in terms of performance. Abu Dhabi 2021 became the breaking point and now it’s a flurry of jabs between the two.
Last season itself Wolff slammed Red Bull for making other teams look like F2 cars. Horner came back and explained how he wondered where all his competitors went. Wolff then suggested that Verstappen’s records are just for Wikipedia to which both Horner and Marko retaliated.
This is just the cream of all the jabs the duo have thrown each other. With Mercedes closing up to Red Bull and now winning two races back to back, it seems like Wolff and Horner will be back in action soon. It’s a matter of when not if.
