Toto Wolff Has ‘No Problem at All’ With George Russell and Lewis Hamilton Battling on Track

It is yet another season when Mercedes is far away from fighting for a championship. George Russell and Lewis Hamilton are sitting way down in P7 and P8 respectively in the driver’s standings. However, the on-track battle between the two teammates has been something to look forward to for the fans. After the Austrian GP, Mercedes team boss, Toto Wolff said that he has no problem with the close racing between his drivers.

Unlike in the closing stages of the Canadian GP, Russell and Hamilton got involved in a wheel-to-wheel battle in the opening stages at Spielberg. After overtaking Carlos Sainz in turn 1 on the opening lap, Hamilton went after Russell for the podium positions for a couple of laps.

However, before the battle could develop any further, the #44 driver got team orders to let Sainz go to prevent a penalty. Unfortunately, that was the end of their battle and Russell went on to claim the race win helped by a collision between race leaders Max Verstappen and Lando Norris.

Hamilton, on the other hand, had to serve a penalty and with a damaged underfloor, he could only bring his Mercedes in fourth. Speaking after the race, Toto Wolff explained that the team had decided to let the two drivers race each other.

Wolff said he had “no problem at all” letting them go wheel to wheel. “We discussed in the morning that they could race. They did it really well,” he added, as quoted on Twitter (now X).

While the two Brits have found themselves close on the track a few times, Russell has clearly been ahead in the qualifying battle. As it stands, Russell leads Hamilton by 9 to 2 in Grand Prix qualifying and 2 to 1 in Sprint qualifying after Austria.

However, this disparity has sparked speculations that Mercedes is deliberately trying to sabotage Hamilton’s final season with the team.

The email controversy on Mercedes’ alleged sabotage of Lewis Hamilton

Following weeks of speculation, a purported Mercedes team member sent an email to F1 representatives and media personnel, alleging “systemic sabotaging” of Hamilton’s car, strategy, and mental health.

Mercedes was quick to initiate a full-blown police investigation into the anonymous email with team boss, Toto Wolff, claiming that the email did not come from a team member. Even Hamilton refused to acknowledge seeing any such email when asked about it.

In the end, the Northamptonshire Police found no criminal wrongdoing in the email controversy. But, they did caution the team about what to do in case such a situation comes up again.