Racing
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Max Verstappen and Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff were photographed together in Sardinia during Formula 1’s summer break for the second straight year, instantly reviving speculation that the Red Bull driver could one day move to Mercedes.
The latest images showed Wolff and his wife Susie Wolff on a jet ski while Verstappen and his partner Kelly Piquet were in the water nearby. The scene closely echoed last summer, when a photo of Verstappen aboard Wolff’s yacht from the same holiday destination spread quickly across the paddock and online.
That repeat sighting carries weight because Wolff’s long-running interest in Verstappen has never been a secret. Since Lewis Hamilton announced on February 1, 2024 that he would leave Mercedes for Ferrari, Verstappen has repeatedly been described as Wolff’s main target for a future Mercedes seat, even though the team ultimately backed Andrea Kimi Antonelli.
The pictures, though, do not by themselves point to active talks. Reporting around the latest Sardinia meeting said there was nothing to suggest the encounter had a professional character, even if it again provided the perfect backdrop for transfer rumors.
Verstappen tried to cool exactly that kind of speculation after the previous summer break. Max Verstappen, speaking after last year’s Sardinia meeting, said: “I love Sardinia, and so does he. I waved to him, we had lunch together and the children played together. When we are there, we talk about everything except Formula 1. You can have very pleasant conversations with Toto and Susie.”
Wolff has struck a similar line in public. Toto Wolff, Mercedes CEO and team principal, said: “Just because we spend our holidays near each other does not mean we are going to work together in Formula 1. We have always got on well and it just happens that we choose similar holiday destinations.”
Even so, he has also left the broader driver-market door open. Asked by Sky Sports Germany about a possible future team featuring Antonelli and Verstappen, Wolff said Antonelli needs time to develop, while Verstappen is operating at his peak and “can do everything.” He added that the pair respect each other, come from different generations, and that having both in one team would be “a completely different starting point.”
The latest speculation was only amplified by the movement of Verstappen’s private jet, which was tracked from Nice to Sardinia and then to Red Bull’s headquarters in Salzburg before returning toward Nice. But, as with the holiday photos, the available reporting stopped short of offering concrete evidence that Mercedes negotiations are under way.
What the Sardinia images have done, again, is show that one of Formula 1’s most persistent driver-market storylines remains alive: Wolff and Verstappen still have a close enough relationship to keep any future Mercedes link impossible to dismiss completely.