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Wolff notes: 'Germany still has a hangover from the Schumacher years'
Mercedes CEO and team principal Toto Wolff hopes entuasiasm about the competition will continue to fuel F1 in the coming years. The Austrian would like to see the German GP return to the calendar, but understands it will not happen in the near future. According to him, the country is still dealing with 'hangover from the Schumacher years'.
In the 2000s, German drivers have a total of 10 world titles in Formula One. Michael Schumacher dominated from 2000 until 2004 earning five titles in a row, Sebastian Vettel went onto win four times from 2010 until 2013, and Nico Rosberg managed to defeat Lewis Hamilton to be crowned in 2016.
Now, there is also German driver on the grid, Nico Hulkenberg, while for example, Italians and Brazilians had to wait to be represented once again for a long time (Andrea Kimi Antonelli and Gabriel Bortoleto will be rookies in 2025). Why did interest in the competition declined recently?
According to Wolff, Germany anno today still suffers from "a hangover from the Schumacher years," he told Stuttgarter Zeitung. The team principal said: "It is a strange German phenomenon and nobody can really explain it. After all, there have always been great German drivers, most recently Rosberg and Vettel."
Wolff on a possible GP in Germany
The viewership numbers are declining in Germany, and there hasn't been a Grand Prix hosted in the country since 2020. To begin with, that weekend at the Nurburgring only happened because of the Covid pandemic.
"For the right return on investment, you first need someone to invest. I ask myself: are the political and economic conditions in Germany such that people want to invest in a Grand Prix?", Wolff wonders aloud.
"But we are high-tech, we are innovative and we have the support of countless people. Back home in Austria, politicians of all kinds of currents support the race because they see its added value," the Austrian team principal concludes.
This article was written in collaboration with Corwin Kunst
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