Christian Horner addressed Toto Wolff's comments concerning Max Verstappen's potential change of teams before 2025.
A couple of weeks ago, Max Verstappen's potential exit from Red Bull was the main topic of discussion. The speculations recently died down, as there are seemingly no issues in Red Bull at the moment, and more importantly, the team from Milton Keynes keeps dominating.
Nevertheless, Toto Wolff talked to the media during the Chinese Grand Prix weekend and suggested there are "some factors" other than the current performance of the cars that might convince Verstappen to change teams.
Reacting to his nemesis's comments, Christian Horner suggested he should focus on improving his own car rather than drivers who are under long-term contracts.
"I don't think Toto's problems are his drivers. I think he's probably got other elements that he needs to be focusing on rather than focusing on drivers that are unavailable."
"I don't know how many more times he needs to say it. He said it numerous times. I'm not going get drawn into it – I think sometimes it's just designed to create noise."
When Toto Wolff was directly asked whether there was a chance of the triple World Champion joining his team next year, he refused to answer as it might "f*** up" his strategy. Horner continued:
"We moved today ahead of the number of races that Mercedes have won in the modern era, so the team [Red Bull] is in form, why on earth would you want to leave this team?"
"Mercedes are the third team behind their customers at the moment, so I would think his [Wolff's] time would be better spent perhaps focusing on the team rather than the driver market."
The Austrian team principal also pointed out that Russell's contract with Mercedes expires next year, and no one is talking about that before adding that Verstappen will be racing for Red Bull next year.
"Have any of you heard George Russell is out of contract at the end of '25? You know, maybe he might not be so keen to stay in '26 – you know, the market moves around."
"I can assure you that there is no ambiguity as to where Max Verstappen will be next year."
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