After Pocketing $3,000,000 by Genius Aston Martin Move, Toto Wolff Showers Heaps of Praise on Fernando Alonso & Co. For Recent Uptick

Aston Martin’s sudden and meteoric rise is one of the biggest highlights of this season. That is despite the fact that we have witnessed only 3 races until now in a season with 23 events. Much of the Silverstone-based team’s rise came at the cost of Mercedes, the constructor they buy their power unit from. The progress they have made since last year made many suspect if there was any foul play behind the scenes. To be more specific, did they breach the budget cap? Before Fernando Alonso & Co. could issue a clarification or deny the rumors, support has come from unexpected quarters, Mercedes boss Toto Wolff.

Alonso sent the F1 in a storm when he battled with Lewis Hamilton at the season opener in Bahrain. After a long fight, the Spaniard finally overtook his old rival, giving fans a déjà vu of the times they shared together in 2007 at McLaren. The man from Oviedo continued the good run in Jeddah and Australia by finishing in P3 thrice in a row.

Toto Wolff praises Aston Martin’s engineers, rules out “magic”

It wasn’t too long ago when Lawrence Stroll expressed his desire to see his team compete for the championship trophies. Given how heavily he has invested in the new facility and hiring the best personnel for the task, it was clear that he wasn’t saying it just for the sake of it. One of the biggest impactful individuals in that team of engineers is former Red Bull aerodynamicist, Dan Fallows. Going by his recent comments, Wolff is going gaga over him and his team. The Mercedes team boss, who owns a 1% stake in Aston Martin, recently made $3 million from their financial success as well. Maybe that is another reason for his high praise.

Motorsport.com recently quoted him as saying, “Where we are today, we just have to acknowledge that one team has done a better job than everyone else, then Aston Martin is the next one to applaud because they’ve just taken a big step forward, and it’s just for the good work, not there is no magic or something that makes it mysteriously fast, it’s just solid engineering and all the unique areas, so I think we should aim for the stars” [Translated using Google]

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Toto also felt that Aston Martin’s rise was a good sign for the sport, a step towards what he feels is the right direction.

Toto feels Aston Martin’s rise proves the success of FIA’s measures to make the sport a level playing field

Over the last few years, the FIA has introduced steps to make the competition even. Among them are the introduction of the cost cap, ground-effect regulations, and restriction of wind tunnel time for top teams. Barring Red Bull, who are currently in a league of their own, pretty much the rest of the grid has bunched up quite a bit. Aston Martin has emerged as a big winner in the whole saga and that is, according to Wolff, a good sign.

He said, “That is what We wanted to have a more financially sustainable future, with ten teams that were capable of competing well with the most advantageous aerodynamic restrictions for those behind.”

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Mercedes, in order to be able to compete at the top again, will have to pull off something along the lines of what the Silverstone-based team has done.