Mercedes boss Toto Wolff wants Verstappen

Mercedes-AMG boss Toto Wolff gave an interview to Racer.

"He is a top driver," Wolff said, adding that Verstappen may not leave Red Bull, where he is under contract until the end of the 2028 season. However, the possibility of Verstappen leaving Red Bull, which has dominated F1 in recent years, has put the other F1 driver markets on hold, Wolff said, repeating a point he made a few weeks ago in another interview immediately after the 2024 Chinese Grand Prix.

Despite Red Bull's current competitiveness, some cracks are beginning to show, and according to Racer, Verstappen has said he would leave if certain key personnel, such as motorsport advisor Helmut Marko, were to leave. Meanwhile, Mercedes is looking for a driver to replace seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton, who signed with Ferrari in 2025. And Wolff did not rule out future talks to put Verstappen in that seat.

"I would like to take some time to see where Max's thinking goes and at the same time monitor the other drivers," Wolff said. One of the other drivers is Carlos Sainz, the only non-Red Bull driver to win a race in the past 18 months.

Verstappen is very likely to stay at Red Bull, but the departure of legendary designer Adrian Newey and reported confidence in Mercedes' progress in developing power units for the new 2026 regulations may already be causing an exodus of engineers from the team. may have already caused an exodus of engineers from the team.

McLaren boss Zak Brown has said that the team has received multiple approaches from Red Bull officials, which Wolff admitted to Racer, but claimed was "not the norm."