Speaking following the 2026 F1 Barcelona-Catalunya GP, Toto Wolff has strongly suggested team orders could come into play as the season progresses. That is if they are fighting another squad for a victory and the lead car is clearly slower.
For the first time since he moved to Scuderia Ferrari, Lewis Hamilton was victorious in red colours. A masterful performance from the now 106-time race winner was a throwback to his dominant wins in a McLaren or a Mercedes.
Looking set for second, Kimi Antonelli broke down with five laps to go and lost 18 valuable points. George Russell got P2 back just a lap after his teammate had passed him. Mercedes’ car gremlins have now hurt both drivers in a Grand Prix in 2026.
Wolff lauds Hamilton after first win in red, happy for his friend Vasseur
Opening his print media session after the 2026 F1 Barcelona-Catalunya GP, Toto Wolff congratulated his former driver Lewis Hamilton on victory 106. Following a very difficult 2025 for the Brit, he has come back strong in the opening part of 2026.
The Austrian also took time to show his appreciation for Ferrari Team Principal Fred Vasseur.
“First of all, congratulations to Lewis. He’s worked so hard and has gone through so many difficult moments, particularly last year, that wholeheartedly I’m happy for him that he’s won.
“And I always said, if it’s not our two to win, then it should be Lewis. And he merited that today.
“Of course, you can say VSC maybe came at the right time, but that’s what it is.
“Happy for Fred also, who had a tough time. He’s my friend, even if he annoys me sometimes, or even if we annoy each other sometimes.
“But the pressure running Ferrari is enormous. And that’s why I’m happy, I’m relieved for him. And it’s something that […] he’s close to my heart.”
Toto Wolff left to ponder a difficult day for Mercedes at the 2026 F1 Barcelona-Catalunya GP
He then turned attention to his own team. The Team Principal for Mercedes through its era of eight consecutive Constructors’ Championship was left to rue more unreliabiliy, this time for car #12. It is an area where Ferrari are going better, even if a power steering issue caused Charles Leclerc to retire on Sunday.
“For the rest, I’m underwhelmed.
“We can’t DNF cars in a kind of regular, a continued way, losing 25 points in the Constructors’ Championship in Montreal and losing another 18 points today.
“In order to finish first, first you have to finish. And reliability, this is what we need to get on top of. And that’s number one. So nobody’s happy about that. And we will leave no stone unturned to understand.”
Team orders to come?
In the first stint on mediums, George Russell pulled over 3s on Lewis Hamilton who was on softs out front, with Kimi Antonelli a further two seconds back.
However, it all turned around from there. As Mercedes fell asleep and failed to react to the three-stop by Ferrari, the pace of car #63 was not great. His Italian teammate closed him down by 8s in 16 laps, and tried to attack him by the 33rd tour into turn 1.
It was not until lap 61 that the championship leader eventually got by, until his car packed up a tour later.
Wolff says discussions will take place to see if a swap could happen during a Grand Prix when a win is in jeopardy against another team. Mercedes did this at Monaco in 2016 as Lewis Hamilton beat Daniel Ricciardo to the victory; Nico Rosberg complied with them.
In stints two and three on Sunday, his 19-year-old driver was comfortably quicker.
“The second thing is that George had an unbelievable beginning of the race. It looked like everybody was standing still behind him. But then the pace fell away.
“And the other stints towards the end of the first and the other two stints, clearly Kimi had the advantage.
“We didn’t interfere in them fighting, because that’s how we’ve always raced. But it’s a situation we need to look into for the future, with both drivers, how to handle a situation where there’s a pace differential, if we are fighting for a victory, or the risk of losing a victory.
“And that’s going to be an interesting discussion, but always totally transparent to the best interest of the team.”
Tough to win 2026 F1 Barcelona-Catalunya GP even without VSC helping Lewis Hamilton: Wolff
Pushed on whether the simulations suggested car #44 would have come out behind both his drivers, Wolff believed holding him off would have been very difficult anyway. Due to his pace and what would have been a tyre offset, a victory seemed fairly inevitable.
“You can’t say, because Lewis was the quickest also afterwards. So even if we would have come out in front of him, it would have been very tricky to hold him behind.”
A review to take place
Pushed on whether he was shocked at a potential rethink of team orders or tactics following Sunday’s events and Lewis Hamilton slashing into Antonelli’s title lead, Toto Wolff reaffirmed that internal discussions will take place on how best for Mercedes to deal with scenarios like what happened in the 2026 F1 Barcelona-Catalunya GP.
“I’ve always said that there is a third party now getting involved in the championship fight, Constructors’ and Drivers’.
“And in that respect, we will discuss internally with the two drivers how we want to handle a situation where we risk holding each other up. I think it’s not going to be a problem.”
