If 2023 were to be Lewis Hamilton and Mercedes’ last year together—considering his contract is expiring at the end of the season—the seven-time champion would’ve wanted to compete as he did back when Mercedes was dominating the field. But so far this season, the W14 hasn’t been up to the mark and has given Hamilton more reason to fret than to celebrate. And who has the onus of making Hamilton stay at Mercedes come upon despite the underwhelming performances? Toto Wolff. 

When Mercedes turned up in Bahrain for the first race of the season in a car that was seven-tenths slower than Max Verstappen’s Red Bull, Hamilton knew his team had to regroup. And while Wolff initially thought the W14’s development would help, he quickly realized that wouldn’t happen. He accepted his and the team’s mistakes and revamped the W14. But since then, it hasn’t made many significant strides, because of which Hamilton’s likelihood of staying at Brackley seemed to be dwindling.

Once again, though, Wolff has accepted that Mercedes is nowhere near the level of competitiveness it’s striving for. And to convince Hamilton to stay, Wolff had to make him believe the team has what it takes to return to fighting form. Hamilton’s pole position in Hungary might’ve helped the process because there’s a high possibility that the Briton will stay at Mercedes until 2025. And when Hamilton recently talked about his contract negotiations, he said, “There is no negotiation left. It is all just small bits.”

In a recent interview on BBC’s Desert Island Discs, where Wolff talked about convincing Hamilton to stay, he accepted Mercedes’ mistakes again and said, “[Hamilton] knows about all the goodness. Although we struggled with the car this year and last year, he’ll be part of the resurrection of the team.” Toto seems confident about Hamilton staying put and helping Mercedes climb back to glory. But how did he convince the seven-time champion to stay?

Read More: With Lewis Hamilton Set to Sign Till 2025, Toto Wolff Slapped With Perplexing Conundrum to Resolve

Toto Wolff’s pep talk to Lewis Hamilton

Hamilton joined Mercedes back in 2013. That’s 10 years he’s spent at Brackley, and it’s safe to say he’s formed a strong partnership with Wolff. And despite Mercedes not meeting his expectations in the past couple of years, the fact that Wolff has supposedly convinced Hamilton to stay is a testament to their belief in each other. But that’s not to say their relationship has been smooth sailing all along. In fact, Wolff had to sit Hamilton down and convince him to stay using an analogy involving Wolff’s wife, Susie Wolff.

In an interview where he discussed Hamilton’s contract negotiations, Wolff revealed, “The kind of analogy I gave to him is that also I have arguments with Susie. Even if we shout [at] each other, which doesn’t happen a lot, but even if we have these arguments, there’s never thought of divorcing. And that’s why I said to him, ‘I don’t want to divorce you, and neither do you because I want the best racing drivers in our cars, and you want to have the best car.'”

Can Lewis Hamiton and Toto Wolff together resurrect Mercedes back to where they want it to be?

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