Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff has sent a warning shot in Red Bull’s direction, threatening to protest the result of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix if the team continue to use their “limbo” rear wing design.
The flexible wing saga continues to boil on despite the FIA clamping down, however because new tests won’t come into force until the French GP, Red Bull and a handful of other teams, can continue to use their rear wing designs at the next round in Baku.
The delay in introducing new load tests has been condemned by Wolff and McLaren’s Andreas Seidl, with both pushing for quicker action to ensure the matter is quickly resolved before the next event, otherwise it risks getting “very messy” according to Wolff, who has threatened to protest the race result.
“I think if the limbo wings are on [the car] in Baku, with the advantage that we see, it’s going to go to the stewards,” Wolff said after the Monaco GP, in which Red Bull claimed victory and moved ahead of Mercedes in the championship standings.
“And if the stewards are not enough, then it’s going to go to the ICA [International Court of Appeal].
“So I guess the FIA is going to clarify things before Baku, because if not, it could be very messy.”
Seidl stopped short of confirming whether McLaren would join that protest, but expressed his displeasure with the matter.
“As we said, we are absolutely not happy that cars that from our point of view are clearly not within the regulations, and after it got detected that they’re not within the regulations, that our competitors can keep running these cars.
“That’s why we have this dialogue with the FIA and then we have to take it from there in the next week.”
Red Bull has since raised concerns over Mercedes’ front wing design, which it says is flexing, but Wolff dismissed those concerns.
“We’ve analysed the front wings, and they are bending exactly the same way as the Red Bull – so we could be protesting each other on the front wing also,” added the Austrian.
Discussion about this post