Toto Wolff hopes Russell will remain a permanent Mercedes driver while Red Bull team-mate Christian Horner says the British driver is on his radar for 2026.
Mercedes boss Toto Wolff believes that their opponents, most notably the Red Bull boss, are just raising by checking George Russell’s name as a future Red Bull option.
Red Bull’s long-term driver line-up was one of the main topics of conversation over the weekend in Singapore, with Daniel Ricciardo expected to be replaced by reserve driver Liam Lawson at RB ahead of the Austin GP. The much-anticipated move is part of Red Bull’s bid to put itself in the best possible position for 2026, with Lawson seen as a potential future team-mate for Max Verstappen, as opposed to the Australian.
Red Bull’s conveyor belt of talented young drivers faces clear discomfort alongside Formula 2 drivers Isack Hadjar and Ayumu Iwasa who are still a few years away from becoming genuine first-team contenders, while despite his consistent performances for RB Yuki Tsunoda has yet to beat Horner to be a potential team leader.
This led Horner to suggest on TV that Red Bull may be looking at other teams to find their new driver as a long-term replacement for Sergio Perez, name-checking Mercedes driver George Russell as a potential candidate.
“Look, we’re not afraid to get out of the loop,” Horner told Sky Sports. “George Russell’s contract expires at the end of next year. It would be foolish not to consider that.”
However, Mercedes boss Toto Wolff quickly dismissed Horner’s suggestion that Russell was available, dismissing the comments as his long-time rival playing games with the media.
“He’s always causing shit, that’s part of the game,” Wolff reiterated. “George is a Mercedes driver and always has been and hopefully will be forever. We have a long contract with him.”
Russell signed a two-year contract extension with Mercedes last summer, meaning he remains with the Silver Arrows until the end of the 2025 season. But when Wolff announced Andre Kimi Antonelli as Hamilton’s replacement at Monza, he noted that there were various options and clauses in Russell’s contract that would tie to Mercedes for years to come.
“These two are the future,” Wolff said of Russell and Antonelli. “They were and will be Mercedes drivers and that’s why we have contracts with George and Kimi that last much longer, which are very complicated in terms of options, etc. Mercedes has always been a pressure cooker, but here we stand as a team today, we want to go with these two [driver],” added the Austrian.
