The countdown to Bahrain continues but it appears emotions from Abu Dhabi remain raw for Mercedes boss Toto Wolff.
Formula 1 and the FIA have tried to move on from the controversial ending to last season, which saw Max Verstappen pass Lewis Hamilton on the final lap to become champion following Michael Masi’s highly contentious decisions during a late Safety Car period.
Masi has since been removed as race director, while a new race management structure has been devised to try and better support the person in that critical role with the introduction of a VAR-style remote race control.
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Those changes have been widely welcomed, but the nature of last year’s defeat clearly still hurts Wolff who made some big claims about a “bromance” between Red Bull sporting director Jonathon Wheatley and Masi.
“He’s [Wheatley] turned Michael Masi the race director, not only in Abu Dhabi but before, and probably Max owes him a lot,” the Austrian told Sky Sports for a new two-part documentary on the events of last year named ‘Duel: Hamilton vs Verstappen’.
Wolff also referenced the agreement Wheatley and Masi made on altering the grid order during the red flag in the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix to argue his case.
With the Australian now gone, the Mercedes boss wants to move on, although admits he may never forgive Masi for what happened.
“I haven’t spoken to him and I don’t want to speak to him ever again,” Toto said.
“His decisions were wrong and I’m sure that he regrets them, but the FIA should have seen much earlier that there was a problem. There was a problem with the structure. There was a problem of personalities.”
On the contrary, Red Bull have remained very supportive towards Masi with Verstappen claiming he had been “thrown under the bus” by the FIA following his “unfair” removal as race director.
Team boss Christian Horner also called his exit “harsh”, claiming there was “an awful lot of pressure” put on the FIA to replace Masi and also revealing Red Bull was the only team to speak in support of him at the recent F1 Commission meeting.
Throughout the fallout, a group of fans have declared Verstappen’s championship as tarnished, some even arguing for the title to be awarded to Hamilton.
But Mercedes boss Wolff did think such talk was wrong, concluding: “I feel for Max. He merits the world championship… but there’s only talk about Abu Dhabi.”
