{"id":28850,"date":"2025-07-29T01:36:09","date_gmt":"2025-07-29T01:36:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/28850\/"},"modified":"2025-07-29T01:36:09","modified_gmt":"2025-07-29T01:36:09","slug":"george-russell-nears-new-deal-with-mercedes-amount-pay-max-verstappen-red-bull-clause-contract-latest-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/28850\/","title":{"rendered":"George Russell nears new deal with Mercedes, amount, pay, Max Verstappen Red Bull clause, contract latest news"},"content":{"rendered":"

George Russell is set to lock in a new, lucrative deal at Mercedes with it looking all but certain that Max Verstappen will be staying put at Red Bull in 2026. <\/p>\n

Fox Sports, available on Kayo Sports, is the only place to watch every practice, qualifying session and race in the 2025 FIA Formula One World Championship\u2122 LIVE in 4K. New to Kayo? Join now and get your first month for just $1.<\/a><\/p>\n

While Mercedes has been strongly connected with a move to poach Verstappen, it won\u2019t be happening until at least 2027. <\/p>\n

That is because the Red Bull driver\u2019s highly-publicised exit clause in his contract is no longer an issue after this weekend\u2019s Belgian Grand Prix.<\/p>\n

ESPN previously reported that Verstappen would have been free to leave Red Bull if he was fourth or lower in the championship after the upcoming Hungarian Grand Prix. <\/p>\n

However, Verstappen\u2019s fourth-place finish on the weekend means he can no longer be passed by Russell on the standings as he currently sits 28 points ahead of the Brit, who can only claim a maximum of 25 points in a single race weekend. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Russell seemed to be at the most risk had Verstappen triggered his clause and while all the outside talks were hardly ideal as he looked to finalise his own future at Mercedes, the 27-year-old told media last week he was \u201cat peace\u201d with the situation.<\/p>\n

He added that he still had not received a contract from Mercedes, seeming to indicate the two parties were still a fair way off coming to an agreement.<\/p>\n

However, an article from The Daily Mail<\/a> on Tuesday claimed Russell is now closing in on a \u00a330 million-a-year ($A61m), multi-season deal to stay at Mercedes, with one source close to the talks telling the publication that \u201call the main points have been agreed\u201d. <\/p>\n

Piastri wins a wet Belgian Grand Prix | 03:52<\/p>\n

\u201cFiner details, such as the number of sponsor appearances Russell will undertake, are still to be ironed out,\u201d the report added.<\/p>\n

Of course, as much as it may seem far away, Verstappen\u2019s current contract runs until 2028 so depending on the length and clauses in Russell\u2019s new deal and Kimi Antonelli\u2019s development, there isn\u2019t anything stopping Mercedes from sniffing around in the future.<\/p>\n

Mercedes boss Toto Wolff confirmed late last month that they were looking into the possibility of signing Verstappen, but also added it wouldn\u2019t impact their talks with Russell.<\/p>\n

\u201cFirst of all, there is no delay in George\u2019s contract situation because it\u2019s pretty clear since a long time what our timings were,\u201d Wolff told Sky Sports at the time. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve known each other for such a long time, so there is no such thing as a delay.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut also as a team principal responsible for the best car brand in the world, it is clear you\u2019re exploring what a four-time world champion is going to do in the future, and that could be a long time in the future. But that has no effect on us putting a signature on George\u2019s contract.\u201d<\/p>\n

Piastri picks off Norris in first lap | 00:32<\/p>\n

Verstappen, meanwhile, said ahead of the Belgian Grand Prix that Christian Horner\u2019s sudden sacking would have no impact on his future with Red Bull and even expressed his strong desire to improve his car in a telling hint of his commitment to the team for at least this season.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think it will matter at all for my decision in the future,\u201d Verstappen said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd yet, the only thing that matters is that we work on the car and make it as fast as we can make it, really. And like I said, the last one and a half years have not been what we want to be.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow we try and be more competitive this year a little bit, but for sure also with the new regulations.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"George Russell is set to lock in a new, lucrative deal at Mercedes with it looking all but…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":28851,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,813,816,85],"class_list":["post-28850","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28850","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28850"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28850\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28851"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28850"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28850"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28850"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}