If you thought F1 is just about fast cars racing on a track, you are wrong. It is about the passion of the men behind the wheels, the delicate structure that keeps everything at work, and the drama of the sport. Perhaps the most fun part of F1 is the drama itself that we get to watch unfold as each season kicks off. And there is no greater drama right now than the soaring rivalry between Red Bull and Mercedes, and their team principals Christian Horner and Toto Wolff.

Toto Wolff and Christian Horner’s rivalry is known even to the most casual of fans of F1. It stretches back far beyond Abu Dhabi 2021, although that was a turning point in their story.

Christian Horner says he does not have any relationship with Toto Wolff

For the first time in years, it is a season where Mercedes has not won a single race. It is the first time Lewis Hamilton has almost gone a season without a single win. In this unprecedented and unnerving time, The New Yorker sought to craft a piece on the man behind the Mercedes marvel, Toto Wolff.

When speaking about his rivalry with the Red Bull team, Toto Wolff narrated an event from the start of the 2021 season. Wolff had sent an email to all his employees asking them to find out who their counterpart was in the Red Bull team. “Look at him/her every day,” Wolff wrote. “Put the picture right in front of you so you know whom to beat.”

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Toto Wolff’s counterpart is Christian Horner, and what might the two think of each other? The New Yorker article states, “Last season, at the peak of the championship duel, Horner was asked, while sitting next to Wolff, to describe the relationship between the two teams. “There is no relationship,” he said. Wolff rolled his eyes.”

“It is the emotion that takes over and says, What a f**king a*sehole. But maybe he is not,” Wolff told The New Yorker.

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“Wolff likens Horner to a yapping terrier,” Sam Knight added in his article. “He does not consult a picture of him every day. “He’s just so simple,” Wolff complained.”

Mercedes Boss criticizes fans booing Max Verstappen at Austin

At the moment though, Red Bull is in hot water over their budget breach scandal. The F1 team was found guilty of a ‘minor overspend’ of their 2021 budget. Toto Wolff has been very vocal about his protest on this subject against Red Bull.

And he is not alone it seems. This weekend at Austin, fans publicly displayed their outrage at Red Bull for their budget breach by booing Max Verstappen.

But, however much the rivalry between the two teams might rage, Toto Wolff is a man of principles. He is notoriously fair and just when it comes to upholding the spirit of sportsmanship.

“That is unacceptable,” told the Mercedes team principal to Sky Germany. “The booing, whether it’s on the podium or on the fan stage, nobody wants to see that. I think we [Formula 1] have done a lot against this kind of behavior. Something like that should not happen.”

“It goes both ways. In Austria it was against Lewis, here [in the USA] it is massively against Max. We have to get everyone on the same page. We fight hard on and off the track, but we don’t have that kind of hostility towards each other.”

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At the end of the day, the enmity exists only on the racetrack and not beyond. No matter how much fans love the drama, it would be wise to keep that in mind, just like Toto Wolff pointed out.