The courtship
Negotiation Mercedes-Verstappenwith the Brackley team trying in every way to convince the Dutch champion to join the silver arrows in 2025 or 2026, continues to be at the center of attention of the silly season of Formula 1. Voices coming from Germany they had suggested that a major turning point might be coming after the weekend in Miamiwhen a perhaps decisive meeting between the Mercedes team principal was expected Toto WolffIneos boss Jim Ratcliffe, Mercedes Benz CEO Ola Kallenius and the ‘clan’ Verstappenconsisting of Max, his father Jos and the manager of the three-time world champion Raymond Vermeulen.
Meeting denied
On the sidelines of a promotional event held on Monday evening in New York together with one of the team’s sponsors, the famous messaging app Whatsappjust Toto Wolff has though denied that there are scheduled meetings with Verstappen’s entourage to determine the future of the orange champion. However, it must be said that Wolff, speaking with the Reuters Televisiondid not in itself rule out the existence of the negotiation, but rather the fact that such delicate meetings could be ‘spoiled’ to the four winds.
“People invent meetings – declared Wolff – he makes up what happens with the pilots, but these things should be behind closed doors and everything that came out wasn’t quite the right thing.” Wolff also commented on the story of possible departure of Adrian Newey from Red Bullsaying that he is observing the evolution of the matter as a “simple fan”. “Adrian Newey is an iconic Formula 1 engineer, with a great CV, and again there are a lot of people talking about what he might do and whether or not he will leave Red Bull – commented Wolff – I look at the story as a simple fan“.
