Wolff steers clear of Horner ‘trap’ despite Red Bull dominance

Mercedes F1's Toto Wolff acknowledges the significant gap between Red Bull and its rivals but won’t advocate for rule changes to restrain the bulls’ supremacy, a “trap” that his RBR counterpart, Christian Horner, once fell into.

In 2022, Formula 1 implemented a major overhaul of its technical regulations in a bid to create closer competition and more exciting racing.

However, Red Bull emerged as a dominant force from the outset, with its sensational 2023 campaign surpassing all records.

And all signs point to the Milton Keynes-based outfit sustaining its hegemony once again this season, sparking fears that the sport’s current lack of parity, should it continue, could potentially alienate fans.

Ironically, Mercedes finds itself on the receiving end of a rival’s dominance almost ten years after enjoying its own period of crushing supremacy.

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However, Wolff won’t follow the approach taken by Horner back in 2015, when the Red Bull team boss lobbied the FIA to alter F1’s regulations and restrict Mercedes’ advantage.

Instead, the Austrian says that Red Bull’s rivals must simply raise their game and do a better job.

“I don't want to fall in the trap of a fellow team principal from next door in 2014/15 who said we should change the regs because it's too dominant,” said Wolff, speaking in Jeddah recently.

“I think they [Red Bull] have done by far the best job of all the teams over the last two years, and credit where credit is due. I mean, they are literally disappearing in the distance as they want and there's nobody else close.

“It's just that they are in a different league. And our sport is an honest sport. The best performance is being rewarded from car, from machine and man.”

Based on the first two races of the 2024 season, Ferrari has emerged so far as Red Bull’s closest rival, although the Scuderia trails the latter by a few tenths of a second in both qualifying and race trim.

But team principal Fred Vasseur believes this gap can be closed by optimizing the potential of the Italian outfit’s SF-24 rather than through an adjustment of the regulations.

“If we're able to have the same improvement as we had last year, it's encouraging,” said the Frenchman. “Honestly, I'm focused on the team, I'm focused on the fact we have to develop the car.

“And even if one weekend we're in front of Red Bull, I will keep this same approach and try to do a better job the week after.

“It's not because we are P1, P2, P3 that you have to stop or develop more. We are fully pushing and will continue with the same approach.

“It's out of my scope the fact that it's interesting or not, but we're just fully focused on the fact we have to catch up.

“It's clear they still have an advantage on us, and we have to continue to develop and to push.”

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