The infighting within Red Bull is a hilarious spectacle for its rivals. For Mercedes Team Principal Toto Wolff, especially, it is music to his ears. The Austrian has pulled all the stops to poach Max Verstappen for 2025, but to no avail. However, with Max’s father Jos Verstappen publicly re-igniting his feud with Red Bull Team Principal Christian Horner, the 3-time champion might be reevaluating his loyalty to the team. Furthermore, his father’s latest crisp response to the Mercedes rumors has disrupted the driver market yet again.

In the Thursday press conference ahead of the Austrian GP, Max Verstappen confirmed his Red Bull stay for 2025, putting a dent in Toto Wolff’s dream of signing him. The Milton Keynes outfit breathed a short-lived sigh of relief before getting disrupted by the Jos-Horner quarrel the next day. Jos exposed Horner for “doing everything” to sideline him from Red Bull’s ‘Legends Parade’ in Austria. Though Horner denied this, Max supported his father’s stance, explaining how this entire distraction could’ve been avoided.

Not-so-coincidentally, this Jos-Horner feud is now overlapping with Max’s Mercedes move speculation. After the 3-time champion’s heroic Pole on Saturday, his father yet again fueled his exit rumors. “There are so many things at stake. I don’t want to say too much,” Jos responded to a question on his son’s future. “So a move by Max to Mercedes is not to be excluded?” Sky Deutschland further prompted. “Exactly”, the 52-year-old replied succinctly, adding, “There’s a lot going on about him, but I don’t want to say anything more about that either.”

If this isn’t a hint for Toto Wolff to keep continuing his pursuit of the reigning world champion, what is? Incidentally, Horner had amusingly used Jos Verstappen as a pawn while taunting Wolff’s pursuit of Max. Even that has backfired for the Briton.

Toto Wolff considers signing Jos Verstappen for Mercedes amid Christian Horner row

Even after Max Verstappen reiterated his loyalty to Red Bull for 2025, Toto Wolff remained in playful denial. When Christian Horner was questioned about his rival team boss’ relentless comments on signing his star driver, he termed it as a “tactic of distraction”. The 50-year-old then joked about how “Jos is potentially available” if Wolff wants a Verstappen at any cost.

When it was the Mercedes boss’ chance to retort, he plainly termed the distraction accusation as “stupid”. As for the Jos Verstappen joke, Wolff mischievously said, “That wouldn’t be bad either.” Though the banter is funny, Wolff’s hopes of signing Max remain “wishful thinking”, as per Helmut Marko.

Max Verstappen is the sole victim of this giant heap of an off-track mess. His Pole by over 4-tenths around the Red Bull Ring, was unfortunately overshadowed by the distractions. Hopefully, the leaders get their arguments straight, so F1 remains about racing and not drama, unlike Netflix’s positioning of it.