Toto Wolff has been urged to pay George Russell a win bonus despite the Mercedes driver’s disqualification from the Belgian Grand Prix.
On Sunday, Russell thought he’d secured the third victory of his young career after pipping team-mate Lewis Hamilton to the post at Spa.
In fact, he even lifted the trophy and sipped champagne on the podium, but was stripped of the win after the race when his car was found to be underweight.
Typically, F1 drivers pocket a bonus every time they win a Grand Prix, but Russell’s predicament raises questions about whether he’s eligible for one.
The 26-year-old outdrove everyone else on the grid, and the fault that prompted his subsequent disqualification had nothing to do with him or his performance. As such, some think the Brit deserves remuneration, including former F1 driver David Coulthard.
“I really feel for George [Russell] because that was arguably his greatest win in his short career, and it slips away from him,” the 53-year-old said on his Formula For Success podcast. “So there’s all sorts of ramifications, aren’t there?
“If you take a managerial role, drivers typically have a win bonus in their contract. It’s the team that have underperformed and that the car is under the weight limit.
“So where do you sit in all that? Would you give a driver [a win bonus] if the car was disqualified or is it only if the actual result stands?”
Former F1 team boss Eddie Jordan, who co-hosts the podcast with Coulthard, also had sympathy for Russell.
“There is no real right way and there’s no real wrong way on this one. And it comes down to compassion and it comes down to the relationship with the driver and the team and just generally,” he said.
It isn’t known whether Russell has a win bonus clause in his Mercedes contract, but Jordan reckoned that if he does, Wolff would make good on the agreement.
“I know Toto. Toto is not a poor man. And he’s very astute and very careful. He sees in George a world champion going forward,” he said.
“Why not pay him the money? If there’s a genuine mistake, which it looks as if it is, that’s what he said in his press release. Pay him the money. George is not going to miss his next meal over whether he gets it or not. But the reality is you’re Mercedes, you’re a top team and you’ve been surprised how great this driver is. Pay him.”
The official result in Belgium sees Russell remain eighth in the championship standings, 15 points behind Sergio Perez, whom he would have leapfrogged with a win. Above Perez is Hamilton, who was awarded the victory after Russell’s DQ, with the seven-time world champion closing the gap on fifth-placed Carlos Sainz to just 12 points.
Oscar Piastri, who ended up second on Sunday, is five points above Sainz in fourth, while Charles Leclerc and Lando Norris are still trailing table-topper Max Verstappen, who ended the race in fourth, by 100 and 78 points respectively.
