Mercedes boss Toto Wolff has continued his feud with rivals Red Bull and Christian Horner by making a jibe about his rivals putting out press releases when staff move across the paddock.
Earlier this year Red Bull chief Helmut Marko said that ‘something like’ 50 members of Mercedes staff had left their rivals to join his manufacturer. This came after Marko's team set up their own engine unit Red Bull Powertrains.
For their new projec.t Red Bull recruited a new team of staff including Mercedes members Ben Hodgkinson and Phil Prew along with a host of other personnel from their rivals.
The staff exodus was helped by the fact there is only 30 miles between Red Bull based in Milton Keynes and Mercedes' home in Brackley. And Mercedes boss Wolff said the movement of staff between F1 teams is normal before firing a dig at his rivals.
Wolff told Motorsport.com : "It’s completely normal. We also have these movements from other power unit manufacturers, although we don’t issue a press release for them every time that happens.
“This is an open market and there are these movements between teams.”
German manufacturer Audi are set to join the F1 circus in 2026, and are reportedly set to partner with Alfa Romeo which could result in more Mercedes staff moving across the paddock.
“We haven’t lost anyone to Audi yet, but there will be situations where some of the Mercedes or ex-Mercedes people will go to Audi, there’s no doubt about that,” Wolff added.
“I think the biggest competition is and was Red Bull because they’re just around the corner. I think there’s a bigger hurdle to changing power unit manufacturers when it comes to moving to Germany, so that’s definitely not something that worries me the most."
Wolff also thinks that the introduction of a cost cap teams can spend on power units will become important in the future.
