Mercedes F1 boss Toto Wolff has revealed that he has studied Manchester United’s poor results in recent years to improve the team’s form.
Since the start of the 2014 season, the Mercedes F1 team has dominated F1, winning every title between 2014 and 2020. Last year, despite losing the drivers’ title to Max Verstappen, he won the constructors’ trophy for the eighth consecutive year.
However, in 2022, when the new F1 regulations are introduced, the Mercedes F1 team is well behind the pace of Red Bull and Ferrari and will miss the title for the first time in nine years.
Manchester United were once one of the most competitive football teams in the world under Alex Ferguson, but the team has struggled since his departure.
Alex Ferguson transformed both Manchester United and English football during his 26-year tenure, with the club winning 38 trophies before retiring in 2013.
Toto Wolff has yet to reach the level of legacy of Alex Ferguso, but his history in F1 has been beaten only by Frank Williams in terms of winning the Constructors’ Championship, and he has overseen the most dominant era in the history of the sport.
Toto Wolff says he studied Manchester United after Alex Ferguson’s reign and made sure they didn’t repeat their mistakes. .
“I studied why great teams can’t repeat great titles,” Toto Wolff told the Financial Times, referring to Manchester United under Alex Ferguson.
“No sports team has ever won eight consecutive world championships. There are many reasons for that, but at the heart of it all is the people.”
Toto Wolff is responsible for maintaining the morale of the more than 1,000 employees associated with the Mercedes F1 team, and says complacency can be fatal, just like any manager whose team has achieved success.
“People become complacent. They don’t have the same energy and may not be as ambitious as they used to be.”
“I get asked all the time, ‘How hard is it?’ I’ve had so many episodes in my life that are hard to judge for so many periods of time. Nothing on the same scale.”
“I don’t think it was challenging in any way, especially since I’ve had much more difficult times in my life, not in F1, but this is really within my comfort zone.”
Despite the Mercedes F1 team’s current struggles, Toto Wolff admits he is enjoying the challenge and sees it as an opportunity to improve in the long term.
“I can say that I enjoy being wrong at the moment because I believe it will be the foundation for long-term future success,” Wolff said.
“We’ve won eight world championships in a row. It’s not like any other sport, and I think I know why.”
“At the moment, various aspects come together to make things more difficult, but in the end it comes down to physics. We got the physics wrong.”
