19 May 2023 , 05:00
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Toto Wolff admitted he and Lewis Hamilton had to rebuild their mutual trust after the Brit's battle against team-mate Nico Rosberg turned ugly.
Hamilton has won six of his seven Formula 1 titles with Mercedes, while Rosberg remains the only driver who ever became champion while team-mates with the Brit. That came at the end of a blockbuster battle between them which led to plenty of flashpoints.
Many of Hamilton's complaints were about the number of reliability issues he was suffering. Aware that his engines were costing him in the title hunt, he took several public swipes at the team including one example when he declared: "Someone doesn't want me to win this year."
Clearly, he believed that there were people within the team who were actively working against him to give Rosberg a better chance of victory. No doubt the team's decision to swap which mechanics were working with which driver fuelled those suspicions.
Rosberg retired after that season and Hamilton won four titles on the spin afterwards. His relationship with the team has more than been restored, but Wolff has admitted that it took some work for them to get back into that position.
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"Trust is a bit of a topic for him and me, and you need to earn trust, test it, and only then can you trust and we built it up over the years," he told ESPN. "We had some tough moments, like in 2016 but we tackled it right away.
Toto Wolff admitted having to rebuild trust with Hamilton (Lynne Sladky/AP/REX/Shutterstock)"It's like [what] I have with Susie [Wolff, his wife] – if I have an issue you pick up the phone immediately and speak. Everything is being discussed and you clear the air, or you agree to disagree. And with him since then we have been super strong."
These days, Hamilton is partnered by George Russell who outscored his more experienced team-mate last season. But David Coulthard has warned the younger Brit to expect a wholly different challenge in the event Mercedes are in a position to compete for regular race victories again.
"The mighty Lewis is still in there, it just won't really show itself until the Mercedes is as mighty as it once was," said the Scot. "George is doing a brilliant job, [he is an] absolute asset for the team. That's not to say Lewis isn't doing a brilliant job, it just means that the car isn't talking to him right now and when it does, expect him to be showing George why he won seven world championships."