Helmut Marko dig at Toto Wolff’s ‘stories’ amid Jos Verstappen v Christian Horner tension

Helmut Marko has brushed off Toto Wolff’s “stories” about Max Verstappen and blames Jos Verstappen’s recent comments on his driver’s father being a “bigger fan” of Wolff’s than he is Christian Horner.

Seeking to secure a fourth successive Drivers’ Championship title, Max Verstappen in the middle of a tense relationship between his father Jos Verstappen and his team boss Christian Horner.

Helmut Marko: ‘Of course, Toto makes stories out of it’

After the latter was accused, although the charges were all dismissed, of inappropriate behaviour towards a Red Bull staff member, Jos Verstappen laid in the boot as he told the Dutch press that Red Bull would “explode” if Horner stayed in his role as team principal with the team “in danger of being torn apart”.

Caught in the middle of the brewing storm, triple World Champion Verstappen insisted his father was “not a liar” but made it clear he just wanted to focus on the “performance side of things”. That’s a stance he maintained throughout the Horner saga, which ended with the plaintiff’s appeal being dismissed.

However, more recently, grievances have been over Red Bull’s diminishing advantage, one that has eroded so much that the Red Bull driver lost the Dutch GP to Lando Norris by 23 seconds.

“That’s not surprising when you regress the car,” Jos Verstappen told Bild after the Zandvoort race, adding: “You can’t sugarcoat it anymore, the situation is serious. Max won’t be happy with having a car like this. Now it’s up to Horner to get the team back on track.”

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And all the while Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff, a good friend of Jos’, has been publicly courting Verstappen and says he made multiple attempts to sign Verstappen, even holding meetings with the driver, his father, and Verstappen’s manager Raymond Vermeulen.

But given Verstappen wouldn’t be drawn on these meetings – “Which meeting? I don’t remember,” he told the media including PlanetF1.com in Zandvoort – Marko says what’s a coffee chat to some is a story to Wolff.

“He wouldn’t be a good team principal if he didn’t try to get Max,” the Red Bull motorsport advisor said on the Inside Line F1 podcast. “I think every top team would like to have Max.

“The other story is all the people live in Monte Carlo. Monte Carlo when there is not a Grand Prix is a quiet place, and there are not so many coffee shops so it’s natural you run into each other, and of course, Toto makes stories out of it.

“On the other hand, Jos Verstappen I think is a bigger fan of Toto’s than he is of Christian.”

Asked why he thinks Jos continues to publicly comment and whether he has scenarios ‘playing out in’ his head with contract clauses in the mix, Marko replied: “Every contract with a top Formula 1 driver has exit clauses which are mainly based on performance.

“So the question ‘why Jos’, you’d have to ask Jos.

“But at the moment Max is focused on the championship and as a team to win this championship.

“We have to look forward and 2026 is coming with new rules and no one knows at the moment who will have a competitive engine.

“Of course what happened in 2014 when all of a sudden the engine we used was at least 50 HP or more behind and was not reliable. So you really don’t know what will happen.

“But at the moment everything is clear, Max will drive for Red Bull Racing next season, and we have to give him a car that can win and all these rumours I think will stop immediately.”

Pressed on what clauses could be written into Verstappen’s contract, Marko refused to give details other than to explain a general clause.

“Of course I don’t want to discuss such clauses but they are based on performances so if the team doesn’t provide a car where the driver can be at the front that is normally a reason why he could leave,” he said.

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