BEVERLY HILL, January 15, (THEWILL) – Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team remains the favourite ahead of the 2021 campaign coming off the back of a Lewis-Hamilton-driven seven consecutive F1 title doubles, ahead with teams carrying over their cars for a second season.
However, Team Principal and Mercedes boss, Toto Wolff, is not oblivious of the challenges that their unit faces as the test period approaches. They face the difficulties of a stringent cost cap, allied to the headache of preparing all new cars for 2021. And he understands that these mean his team must brace itself for a tough season.
The Austrian CEO made this clear when expressing his thoughts ahead of the new campaign: “For us, it will be an interesting year, because we need to structure ourselves in a different way than we have done before, due to the cost cap.
“We are facing this formidable challenge of slightly tweaked 2021 regulations and a big earthquake of regulatory change for 2022.
“There’s factors that are working against us that motivate us a lot, factors that are working for us, because we believe we have a good organisation. But overall, we embrace change and we’ve always done so in the past. So the organisation is very much looking forward into 2022.”
Added to all these is the niggling issue of a new contract with Mercedes’ record-breaking British driver, Sir Lewis Hamilton. As that contract negotiation drags further, the consolatory certainty for the F1 unit is that Wolff himself has committed to a new deal to remain as Team Principal for the next three years, which was a previous bother as well.
With that out of the way, Wolff is now laser focused on his commitment to his best for Mercedes, yet mindful of the necessity to evolve a succession plan at some point of his new deal.
“I enjoy the connections that I have within the team, and as long as I think that I can contribute, this is my role,” he clarified.
“But equally, I have to make sure that I’m not creating a bottleneck in the leadership of the team. And that is my responsibility for our employees, for Mercedes and for the shareholders of Mercedes GP: to look at the time where I can hand over the baton to someone that is better than me.”
The inclusion of world-leading chemical giant INEOS as joint-owners and team shareholder, which necessitated a revision of team management structure and shareholding was partly responsible for the delays in finalising the details of Wolff’s retention on board and INEOS has waded into the contractual issues with Hamilton as well.
The new relationship took some time to iron out and Wolff referenced this in his remarks: “My relationship with Ola, Daimler and the board and the various people that work for Daimler is as good as it can be. And we have a company that we jointly own.
“Looking into the future is not always as simple as just extending an employment contract, because it is about talking about the relationship among shareholders in the future. And that is something that takes time.
“In every other corporate structure or business, it doesn’t go from one day to the other that you simply find a solution to every question around governance and future shareholding. So, it is the normal way of things.”
Attention has turned to working out a new contract with Hamilton which is reportedly progressing, but a deal is not imminent and the Brit remains a free agent but without a spare driver seat anywhere on the circuit ahead of the March opening Grand Prix.
Despite being 36 years old, Hamilton is demanding a multi-year contract to make sure he stays with Mercedes until the end of 2022 at the very least. But, with the impressive Williams driver George Russell waiting in the wings, a one-year rolling option is what Mercedes appears keen to offer.
However, Wolff confirmed in December, as reported by THEWILL, that the deal may not be announced until pre-season testing. Even if no contract has been agreed upon by both parties now, there is no apparent cause for concern, yet. It is expected that a deal will ultimately be struck before the first race of 2021 in Bahrain in March or before then.
About the Author
Jude Obafemi is a versatile senior Correspondent at THEWILL Newspapers, excelling in sourcing, researching, and delivering sports news stories for both print and digital publications.
