Horner hits back at Wolff: ‘A Mercedes concept issue, not F1’s regulations’

Wolff had a heated exchange with Horner and Ferrari chief Mattia Binotto during a team principals’ meeting on Saturday at the Canadian Grand Prix over the subject of cars bouncing. 

It came after the FIA issued a new technical directive on the eve of the weekend to try and help combat the mix of porpoising and bouncing the new ground-effect F1 cars are suffering with. 

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After qualifying in Montreal, Wolff slammed Mercedes’ rivals for being “disingenuous” and playing “political games”, adding they were guilty of “manipulations in the background”. 

But Horner is standing firm in his position that other teams should not be punished for Mercedes’ failure to get on top of their bouncing issue. 

“Obviously Ferrari presented its position regarding the TD and Toto is campaigning for a change in regulations - which is somewhat ironic because his car looked quite quick today with not a lot of bouncing,” Horner said after Sunday’s race. 

“And I think it was just pointed out to him clearly that perhaps his issues were within, rather than everybody's issue?”

When asked about the meeting being caught by the Netflix cameras, Horner replied: “I think there was an element of theatre going on in that meeting, so maybe with Lewis's new movie coming along he's getting in role for it.”

Horner also dismissed Wolff’s claim that Red Bull’s Sergio Perez had been among the drivers to raise concerns about the regulations amid fears over possible long-term health impacts. 

“The issue with Mercedes is more severe, or certainly has been prior to [Canada], than any other car,” he added. 

“That surely is down to the team - that’s within their control to deal with that. 

“It's not affecting others, I know they've said that other drivers have been complaining, our drivers have never complained ever about porpoising or...they've said certain circuits could do with tidying up and perhaps resurfacing in places. 

“But certainly we haven't had an issue with bouncing. The problem is they are running their cars so stiff, I think their concept is the issue rather than the regulation.” 

Teams will get on top of bouncing in time 

Horner believes teams will ultimately control the bouncing issues over time and do not need the FIA’s intervention to help.

He argued that F1’s governing body the FIA are within their right to simply disqualify any car that is deemed to be dangerous and a risk to other competitors. 

“The teams have got some of the brightest engineering talent in the world,” Horner said. “Things will converge. 

“I doubt we will be sitting here next year talking about the bouncing even if the regulations were left alone. These cars are still relatively new, they are still as teams add developments to their cars you'll probably see them start to address some of these issues. 

“You can't just suddenly change technical regulations halfway through a season. If a car is dangerous, a team shouldn't field it. It has that choice. 

“Or the FIA, if they feel an individual car is dangerous, they always have a black flag at their disposal.” 

Meanwhile, Binotto has made Ferrari’s stance on the matter clear, revealing the team has told the FIA they do not consider the technical directive to be “applicable”. 

“For us, that TD’s not applicable,” Binotto said. “And it’s something we mentioned to the FIA.

“A TD is there to clarify regulations, or to address policing. It is not there to change the regulations. That’s [a matter of] governance.”