Mercedes boss Toto Wolff and his wife and F1 Academy director Susie Wolff are being investigated by the FIA Compliance Department for a possible conflict of interest. The Austrian allegedly receives numerous information about the activities of the FOM, while the Scot possesses the conclusions of the negotiations between the team leaders.
The Wolffs seem to know some things they shouldn’t know. Toto Wolff, through his partner, has access to certain confidential information of the Formula 1 management – Susie Wolff is, as the director of the F1 Academy, subordinate to the head of the F1 Stefano Domenicali and is in close contact with the management of the “efjednotka” -, while the former racer knows, so to speak, about everything essential, which will be heard at meetings of team leaders.
Understandably, the team bosses do not like this, since Wolffová can take out some confidential and classified information to the top management of F1. In addition, it is said that Toto Wolff recently got into trouble with the team bosses, who was supposed to argue at the last meeting and blurt out something that should not have been known to him.
The bosses of the other units therefore ran out of patience and turned to FIA President Mohamed bin Sulayem with a complaint, who intends to investigate the whole matter. A statement from the International Automobile Federation on Tuesday said: The FIA is aware of the media speculation, which centers on alleged confidential information that a member of the FOM team (Susie Wolff, editor’s note) is passing on to the F1 team boss. The FIA Compliance Department is (already) looking into this matter.
Mercedes responded to the FIA’s opinion with the following statement: We’ve recorded the FIA’s general statement from this evening, responding to unsubstantiated reports from a single media outlet and an off-the-record briefing that linked him to the head of Mercedes-AMG F1. The team had not received any report from the FIA Compliance Department on the matter and it was very surprising that they learned of the investigation through a media release.
We completely reject the allegation in the statement and the associated media coverage that unfairly impugns the integrity of our team boss. Of course, we expect full, prompt and transparent correspondence from the FIA Compliance Department regarding this investigation and its content.
After Mercedes, Formula 1 itself also reserved itself in the face of accusations from the FIA: We have registered the FIA’s public statement released this evening, which was not provided to us in advance. We are absolutely convinced that the allegations are false. We have robust processes and procedures in place to ensure the separation of information and responsibilities in the event of any potential conflict of interest.
We are confident that no member of our team has disclosed any unauthorized information to the team leader and we caution anyone against making reckless and serious accusations without evidence.
Toto Wolff has been under fire twice in the past for having knowledge that he should not have. For the first time in June of last year, when Mercedes managed to install this technical innovation on both of its single-seaters just a few hours after the permission to introduce the second anchor cable, the competition just shook their heads incomprehensibly.
For the second time in October of the same year, when the Austrian accused Red Bull of exceeding the budget ceiling even before the whole matter was reported in detail by the International Automobile Federation. Ralf Schumacher believed at the time that the informant in both cases was Shaila-Ann Rao, a former adviser to Toto Wolff and Mercedes, who is currently the FIA’s secretary for sport.
The conclusions of the investigation and whether Toto Wolff and Susie Wolff were guilty in any way will probably be known soon. It is currently unknown what possible punishment the married couple may face. However, if the above information proves to be true, Formula 1 will face one of the biggest cases in recent years.
2023-12-05 19:54:10
#FIA #investigates #Toto #Susie #Wolff #conflict #interest #Magazine #F1online.sk
