Toto Wolff could barely hide his frustration after the Hungarian GP. The Mercedes team boss sharply criticized the communication between some teams and their drivers during the race at the Hungaroring. Due to a system error, many drivers did not receive blue flag notifications on their steering wheel. According to Wolff, many race engineers failed to timely indicate when a driver was being lapped.
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Wolff’s anger stemmed from the problems surrounding backmarkers. Due to a system malfunction, drivers did not receive automatic signals on their steering wheel and had to rely on old-school flags and instructions from their race engineers. This led to several difficult situations, including the collision between Oscar Piastri and Carlos Sainz. The latter did not leave room for the virtual race leader and had to pay for it with a five-second time penalty. The system error also led to significant time loss for Kimi Antonelli and Lewis Hamilton.
Teletubbies
According to Wolff, the battle between Antonelli and Hamilton was particularly influenced by the poor communication. Both drivers lost time behind Gabriel Bortoleto, giving Max Verstappen more room in the fight for second place. Hamilton came within half a second of Antonelli but did not attack because the situation behind the Audi was not clear. “It’s simply scandalous that some of those Teletubbies engineers at the pit wall don’t open their mouths and tell what’s happening behind them,” Wolff told Sky Sports. “I’m just not happy with the whole situation.”
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Despite the frustrations, Wolff looks back on the first half of the season with a positive feeling. Antonelli finished third in Hungary, extending his championship lead over Hamilton to 50 points. Mercedes also enters the summer break with a 72-point lead over Ferrari in the constructors’ championship. “When I calm down for a moment, I see that we are going into the summer with a solid lead in the World Championship,” Wolff continued contentedly. “We also have a significant lead in the constructors’ championship, and that is thanks to a fast car and a great team.”
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