Big changes are in the offing for F1 as cars are set to bunch up closer than ever to produce a season of ecstatic racing. This is exactly what every single one of us heard when the sport acknowledged the regulation tweaks for the 2022 season.

However, many including Dr. Helmut Marko and Valtteri Bottas recently admitted that the changes aren’t noticeable enough and hence, predicted a repeat of 2021.

The Red Bull advisor, in specific, sounded quite confident that Mercedes and Red Bull will continue to lead the way while teams like Ferrari, McLaren, and Alpine will tag along with a certain amount of gap to the front-runners.

But, for the first time, here’s someone who has acknowledged the hype surrounding the 2022 campaign – Toto Wolff. The Mercedes boss opined that none of the teams will be able to pull out the 1-second lead from the rest of the grid, unlike in the past.

What did the Mercedes boss say?

During an exclusive interview with Auto Motor Und Sport, Wolff opened up that finding loopholes is not going to work anymore. Even if a team does manage to pull off a smart invention by exploiting a loophole in the rulebook, the other teams are most likely going to copy it with ease, considering the simplicity of the 2022 cars.

Hence, no matter how far a team manages to get themselves ahead of the others, Wolff felt that the dominance would only last for a short period of time.

“I believe that the budget cap will adjust a lot. If someone finds a loophole and runs away with it, everyone will recreate it. The cars will all be very similar. There can still be differences in the first year. After that it will balance out. There will no longer be a team that drives a second ahead,” he said.

Watch Story: When F1 Drivers Had a Blast on Top Gear Featuring Hamilton, Vettel & Ricciardo

F1 will be like Super Bowl

Wolff further acknowledged that more F1 teams will start to challenge for the title in the coming years. “Of course, the teams that had deep pockets weren’t particularly happy that we lost an advantage there. But the whole thing has degenerated into an arms race between Red Bull, Ferrari, and us,” he said.

“Now everything will be more balanced. I think there are five or six teams that can win in the future. That’s good for sports. It’s not always the same team that wins the Super Bowl.”

Overall, the excitement continues to rise as the much-awaited 2022 season inches closer. So, will Wolff’s words come alive over the very first season of the new era? We’ll know in time.

Read More: Who Owns the Red Bull F1 Team?