Valtteri Bottas, Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes, Silverstone, 2019

Wolff wants “hard racing”, but not between Hamilton and Bottas

2019 British Grand Prix

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Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff says he’s pleased to see more “borderline dirty” driving in F1 – as long as it’s not between his drivers Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas.

While FIA race director Michael Masi has insisted the stewards did not Silverstone stewards did not police the British Grand Prix more leniently than previous rounds, Wolff said he was pleased by the robust racing between Charles Leclerc and Max Verstappen last weekend.

“You can clearly see that the Leclerc-Verstappen incident of Austria being interpreted exactly in the way it was in Austria,” said Wolff.

“Hard racing is permitted. You can push somebody out whilst exiting a corner. I think this is how it is allowed in most of the other formulas.

“It needs to be between teams: team against team. This is what we all and the fans want to see but it is hard racing. It is something we need, I think.”

However Wolff was pleased Hamilton and Bottas showed more restraint during their fight for the lead at the start of the race.

“This is exactly why we have debated in the morning,” said Wolff. “I don’t want to see anything of this in an intra-team battle.

“I have no doubt that these guys know how to race each other. We’ve seen that now on many occasions between Valtteri and Lewis. They respect each other off-track and they respect each other on-track. And to take it another step is fair enough if you’re racing another team.

“But I really I thought it was very good racing between the two of them. Certainly very entertaining, nobody could say that there wasn’t hard defending, but it wasn’t dirty. And I think what you’ve seen between some of the other drivers is is borderline dirty.”

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19 comments on “Wolff wants “hard racing”, but not between Hamilton and Bottas”

  1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
    20th July 2019, 11:57

    This is exactly the reason why I see Hamilton and Bottas being a better driver pairing then when Rosberg was there. They show a lot more respect for each other. Although Rosberg was overall better than Bottas, Rosberg’s manner of driving and the fact he didn’t get on with Hamilton seemed to result in crashes or damage sometimes ruining the results. Bottas has sometimes fallen back a few places but what he’s done was nothing like these 2 coming together in Spain 2016 and ending the teams race. It is good that they are both careful with each other. But what we saw last weekend was very good from both of them and it isn’t often we see this.

    I don’t see any reason for Mercedes to risk changing the line up when it just works like this. If Bottas isn’t fully on it, it seems Hamilton is usually at his best level, and Bottas usually helps him a little by being the team player. I hope he will remain strong all the way through this season. But even if he doesn’t, the last 2 seasons, he’s still been good in terms of holding up the others helping Hamilton get better results. Don’t think many other drivers would do this. Some may consider this a weakness. In some areas, it certainly is. But I think Bottas is looking stronger this year.

    1. Hamilton was using borderline dirty moves against Rosberg. Rosberg just did not let Hamilton do everything/anything. Plus, Hamilton has no reason to fear Bottas, therefore he can allow to be more “polite” while racing each other.

      Bottas is good enough for Mercedes for this and next year given their superior performance (on average). 2021 is an other story.

      1. F1oSaurus (@)
        20th July 2019, 12:48

        @f1mre No Hamilton was not. He had the rights to the racing line and the driver behind is supposed to yield. If he tries to stay next to the lead car he will end up off track.

        Rosberg was simply abusing Wolff’s nonsensical additional rules.

      2. Like creating an incident at Monaco to ruin his team mate’s qualy run – oh wait, that wasn’t Ham that was Ros…

        1. Right! That was disgusting. How about when Rosberg did the most blatant ridiculous blockpass in Austria causing his own puncture ? Also, I still feel like Barcelona was caused by Nico making a sketch move as well. I just don’t know how anyone can defend his move which pushed LH onto the grass. Closing the door is one thing, forcing the opponent into the grass claiming “my corner” when not even in the braking zone🤔🤷🏻‍♂️… . For me that one was clear. If Rosberg gave an extra couple feet then LH would not have been in the grass which caused the accident. I remember Hamilton running Nico out wide at COTA. Overall I recall NR being the one who made the majority of the over the top moves because he knew that Hamilton was a little stronger overall and it was the only way he could really fight with him much of the time. You can see it now in the way Nico praises Lewis . He thinks LH is the best in the world in open wheel racing and I’m sure he would not deny that Hamilton was the stronger package as a driver.

    2. @thegianthogweed This is exactly why I don’t see the point of replacing Bottas with Ocon at the end of the year. Bottas isn’t exactly underperforming, he’s doing a decent job, but clearly just isn’t a match for Hamilton over a season. I don’t see what they would gain by putting Ocon in the 2nd car. He ‘might’ be better than Bottas, although even that isn’t certain, but he is much less likely to accept a beating from Hamilton, and more likely to cause some issues. He’s already had multiple clashes with his former teammate Perez, and ofc the infamous Verstappen incident.

      Part of me hopes they do put Ocon in the car, because it might lead to more incidents and clearly the Hamilton/Rosberg dynamic was much more entertaining for fans than the Hamilton/Bottas lovein, but if I was team principal, there’s no way I would take the risk.

        1. Keith – “…the infamous Verstappen incident…” – and how should that be judged post Austria?

          1. The same way.

        2. @bosyber 2nd time this has happened in the last few days but I’m not Keith Collantine, there is more than one Keith in the world :)

          1. Lol, yes @keithedin, I might blame autosuggest, or perhaps you being equally knowledgeable and eloquent in your post, so that I didn’t register that one!

    3. Rosberg and Hamilton used to friends until it got too tense between them BECAUSE Rosberg was trying to win just as much as Hamilton was @thegianthogweed.

      It’s easy for Hamilton to be friendly with Bottas, because he isn’t really pushed to the limit by him. If Bottas would consistently show the form he showed for the start of the year, we would see that respect between them you marvel at shatter quite quickly.

      Off course the team principle can be satisfied – they can have Hamilton focus on winnign the thing, while Bottas is close enough to keep his teammate sharp and pushing, but not a threat.

  2. F1oSaurus (@)
    20th July 2019, 12:46

    I think ultimately this approach is what cause the Hamilton – Rosberg issues though.

    When Wolff says they are not allowed to “race hard” then he’s setting his drivers up for some very unfair racing. The reason why drivers are allowed to push the others off is because there is a racing line. If you are forced off the racing line then you pretty much lose the corner. So there are rules for who has the rights to stay on the racing line.

    Yet Wolff is basically saying “when you have a front wing next to the car ahead, the car ahead should yield the racing line and allow both cars to go through a corner where there really is only one line”.

    Then we get the crying on the radio “he pushed me off!” “ah sorry yes I understeered a it”.

    Or Rosberg actually deliberately driving into Hamilton “just to prove a point”. Clearly Rosberg had part of his front wing in and then Rosberg’s “point” was that Hamilton should have taken a wide line leaving Rosberg space. It’s utterly ridiculous.

    Rosberg knew perfectly well how the rules work because in Canada 2016 he first complained that Hamilton “pushed him off” after the start, but when he had exactly the same situation against Verstappen a few laps later … he simply yielded as any race driver does in that situation.

    I get that Wollf doesn’t want the dive bombing and dirty driving that Verstappen and Leclerc were showing with lots of contact. Or which Rosberg demonstrated in Austria and Germany in 2016. A driver has the rights to the racing line, but that does not mean that you can deviate even to the outside of that line and go even further out of your way to push other drivers off. I get that, but still the racing line should be for the car ahead and the other should yield when (before!) the “wedge” disappears.

    1. There was no dirty driving between Leclerc and Verstappen at Silverstone.

  3. I’d take the type of racing we had between LH and NR over what we don’t have between LH and VB any day. VB is simply no challenge to LH while they sit in dominant cars and run away from the rest. Oh well, at least Max and Charles are filling in in the excitement category.

  4. Jose Lopes da Silva
    20th July 2019, 17:57

    Watching the same team winning over and over again seems wrong, but at least we could have a title battle.

    We had titles battles in 2014 and 2016. So far, being 7-2 in wins, we’re not having a title battle at all. Bottas season so far seems the definite disappointment. Of course, no reason to replace the guy who’s in 2nd place of the championship.

    1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
      20th July 2019, 20:11

      If Hamilton had similar reliability this year to the start of 2016, Bottas would easily have more wins than him at this stage. Mercedes reliability has been better since Bottas has joined it seems. And Hamilton has just been better than Bottas overall. I couldn’t say bottas’s season has been disappointing though.

      1. I think people fail the understand that Hamilton’s mind set changed after 2016 as well.

        During the Rosberg era, I don’t think Hamilton ever took him all that seriously – he’d soundly beaten him right through junior formulae and always knew he has the pace to beat him. He just got undone by a reliability issue whe he was going for the kill like he’d done in previous seasons.

        His driving post 2016 has been exceptional. I suspect against any other teammate (except for maybe Max, Vettel or Ricciardo) Bottas would be an absolutely outstanding driver but Hamilton since 2016 has not really had any mental slips and in the best car is pretty much unbeatable. For Bottas to be even pushing him a as hard as he has is pretty remarkable. Just wrong place at the wrong time for him unfortunately as has been the case for many other drivers over the years.

      2. Also Hamilton’s been way more consistently at near the top of his game, or at least good enough to beat Bottas. There have been a few poor weekends, Canada 2018 springs to mind, but much fewer than in previous years I feel.

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