Wolff didn't convince everyone at Mercedes: 'We've heard that more often'
F1 News
- GPblog.com
Toto Wolff has the whole of Mercedes completely to his liking, but when he entered the team in 2013 not everyone was immediately convinced. The Austrian had to work hard to gain the trust of the employees at Mercedes.
Mercedes in F1
Mercedes had entered the sport in 2010 with biggest plans. After a championship year under the name BrawnGP, there was a solid foundation for success. With Brawn and team boss Norbert Haug, it just wouldn't work under the Mercedes name to become successful. This only happened after Wolff was appointed.
The current Mercedes team boss was brought from Williams to Mercedes and Wolff played a particularly important role in how much Mercedes was going to invest. Indeed, Wolff saw that Mercedes was not putting enough money into the project to be truly successful.
No confidence
In addition to the finances of the parent company, the team also needed to get all their noses in the same direction. Wolff tried to do this at his very first speech for the team, but not everyone was immediately enthusiastic: ''We've heard this before,'' technician who was the last to leave the pad informed Wolff in passing, the team boss now says at the Frankfurter Allgemeine.
However, Wolff did not just stop at a speech, but also showed with his actions that he wanted to lead the team to the top. This ensured that Mercedes won the world title among constructors and drivers in 2014 and would do so for another six years after that, plus a world title among constructors in 2021.