Toto Wolff queries willingness of rivals to "humiliate" themselves over engine rules saga

Mercedes

Wolff queries willingness of rivals to "humiliate" themselves over engine rules saga

Wolff reiterated his defiant stance on balance of performance in F1

Ewan Gale

Tuesday 5 January 2021 07:59

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Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff has questioned why rival manufacturers would want to endure the "humiliation" of balancing the performance of power units in Formula 1.

Discussions over the future for power units within the current regulations intensified last season with engine freezes and balance of performances mentioned as part of the scramble to give Red Bull a fighting chance once Honda leaves at the end of this year.

After Wolff labelled the balance of performance idea "the beginning of the end", Ferrari boss Mattia Binotto suggested a convergence mechanism within an engine freeze in order to restore parity, something the Austrian called insulting.

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"If you recall, we had a token system in the past when the regulations came out," he explained, referring to the introduction of hybrid engines in 2014.

"Because some of our colleagues wished the tokens to be removed in order to catch up, we agreed to the removal of the tokens.

"Now, some of our colleagues come back with a system of convergence which honestly is a bit of an insult.

"When you look at the last few years and the development and performance of the engine, Ferrari has been the most powerful in 2018 and by far the best in 2019 and we developed our engine.

"We continued to push our boundaries and we brought something to the track in 2020 that we were hoping would catch up.

"That's why I cannot comprehend that any car manufacturer that trusts in its abilities to build a power unit and chassis would want some kind of mechanism to balance the power units out. I don't think anybody would accept such humiliation in public."

Referring directly to the comparison between the balance of performance and Binotto's theory of convergence, Wolff dismissed any distinction between the two solutions.

"I don't see any difference, and like I said before, it would be the beginning of the end," added Wolff.

"The power unit is not only measured by the sheer max power, but it is subject to drivability, to weight, to cooling and introducing a simple formula that fits all isn't possible."