Wolff joins criticism of Red Bull: 'Let's be a bit objective'

McLaren bosses Zak Brown and Andrea Stella were highly critical of Max Verstappen and Red Bull Racing after the incident with Lando Norris in the Austrian Grand Prix. Toto Wolff stood up for the Dutchman and remains so, but he agrees with Brown's criticism of Red Bull's team.

Wolff critical of Red Bull

Asked how he expects the bond between Verstappen and Norris to be after the Formula 1 race at the Red Bull Ring, Wolff replied: "First of all, the drivers among themselves will know best. Lando and Max, they get on with each other very well. They will have discussed it. They're not going to thrash each other in the media, but talk it through and all the good guys will have a judgement on that and we'll see what it means."

He continued: "I think that's number one. And number two is there's a set of regulations and those regulations give the boundaries to the drivers, what's on, what's not. It's the same with track limits. You're either penalised or not. And in the same way, the way you race. And I think with with regulations maybe a little bit vague or interpretations different from time to time it's clear that the really good ones are going to push this as much as they can and then we could end up in similar situations."

Earlier, Wolff suggested that the FIA may need to provide more clarity on exactly what is and is not allowed. Several F1 drivers, including Fernando Alonso and Carlos Sainz, also expressed criticism of the rules and their interpretation. "It's not only among these two I mean between the Alpines, etc." the Mercedes team boss explained.

Wolff may disagree with the criticism of Verstappen, but he does agree with McLaren CEO Brown's criticism of the team management at Red Bull. "So I agree with Zak on the regulations tell us what's on and what's off, number one. Number two I tend to agree with Zak, it's always amusing to see the just one-dimensional comments of team principals where you think let's be a little bit objective at least." Wolff said.

This article was written in collaboration with Sophia Crothall.