Mercedes' Wolff primed for Ferrari fight after Australian GP

Toto Wolff is confident Mercedes will fight for the world championship this year, but is expecting a battle with Ferrari based on the season-opening Australian Grand Prix.

Mercedes entered the first race of the year as many teams’ pick as favorite for 2026, and duly locked out the front row before George Russell led home a one-two. A big margin in qualifying was much reduced in the race, however, as Charles Leclerc led early on and both he and Lewis Hamilton troubled Russell until diverging strategies limited Ferrari to third and fourth.

“There's so much contentment that I feel in the team at the moment,” Wolff said. “We've had such a winning streak with these eight championships, and then very difficult years. We still won races and finished second in the championship, but a solid one and two where you feel a season ahead, that means you can fight for a world championship... that wasn't for a long time.

“Therefore, you're probably more grateful when you bounce back like this, having known the difficult years, rather than just continuing. That's why I'm very happy for everyone.

“When it comes to Ferrari, before the race, people were saying, ‘Mercedes are going to disappear in the distance, looking at your long runs’. And that wasn't the case.

“We knew that they were strong on the starts, and that's what happened. It was an out-and-out battle between Charles and George at the beginning. Kimi [Antonelli] was a bit unlucky that the battery wasn't at the level that it should have been. On either car, actually, to a certain degree.

“It was a three-way fight at a certain stage, between the two Ferraris and George, and eventually Kimi caught up. So for me, the prevailing feeling is now we have a fight on our hands with Ferrari. 

“The worry that we had was that it wasn't exciting, in terms of the fighting and the boost, and the overtake modes made it actually quite interesting to watch. On a track that is particularly difficult for energy. So we'll see how that goes in Shanghai. But most of all, there's a certain degree of contentment that Mercedes is back.”

Mercedes’ victory comes against the backdrop of dissent from a number of drivers over the style of racing produced by new regulations, but Wolff says claims the previous generation of car was loved by the drivers are false.

“I didn't hear any one of the drivers speaking particularly good of the last cars, and saying it was the best car. So we tend to be very nostalgic when looking at past events," he said.

“But clearly, we're all stakeholders of the sport. We need to have a great spectacle, the best cars in the world and the best drivers, and being exciting for the fans. That's why we just need to look at the product.

“One perspective is the view of the drivers, which is an important perspective. But Stefano [Domenicali, F1 CEO and president] would say that the single matrix that matters to him is whether the fans like it. That is what we need to look at. If it needs to be tweaked, if we need to adjust, I think we have the flexibility in Formula 1 to always take those decisions.”