However, Aston Martin have recently closed the door on a move for Horner — with Jonathan Wheatley lined up for the beleaguered British team — while Wolff and Mercedes are now actively looking at buying private investment firm Otro Capital’s 24% shares in Alpine.<\/p>\n
The Enstone team confirmed in January that Horner was among a group of investors interested in acquiring the same stake.<\/p>\n
In an interview with the Press Association, Wolff said: “He [Horner] has broken quite a lot of glass, and these things have repercussions in our microcosm. When you say things … but that is what he has done all his life, and that is what he knows best.<\/p>\n
Wolff and Horner’s rivalry often took centre stage as Mercedes and Red Bull have dominated F1 for the last decade\u00a0Mark Thompson\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
“Us looking at that stake is in no connection with Christian. And the idea that there is a rivalry between Christian and me around who buys an Alpine stake is made up. It would be quite sad if that was a consideration of doing such an investment or not.<\/p>\n
“We are looking at it from different angles, and we haven’t come to any conclusions. We want to know whether it makes sense.”<\/p>\n
Wolff’s rivalry with Horner shaped F1 for much of the past decade as Mercedes and Red Bull fought on the biggest stage.<\/p>\n
The last 18 months of Horner’s trophy-laden tenure came amid accusations of controlling behaviour by a female colleague. Horner was twice exonerated of the claims.<\/p>\n
And Wolff, 54, continued: “I am in two minds about it [Horner returning to F1.] The sport is missing personalities. And his personality was clearly very controversial and that is good for the sport.<\/p>\n
“I said to [Ferrari team principal] Fred Vasseur that it needs ‘the good, the bad, and the ugly.’ And it is now only the good and the ugly left. The bad is gone.<\/p>\n
– Forget luck: Antonelli shows he’s an F1 title threat in Japan<\/a> “Would I consider that he could ever be an ally or someone that shares objectives? I don’t think so.<\/p>\n “But even when I had the biggest frustration, and anger with him, you need to remind yourself that even your worst enemy has a best friend so there must be some goodness.<\/p>\n “If there wasn’t that competitive rivalry over so many years, and if there was more water down the river, I am sure I could have had hung with him over dinner and a had a laugh.<\/p>\n “Over those years it was just too intense, too fierce, and things happened which even today I cannot comprehend why he has done them.<\/p>\n “I don’t know if he is finding his way back, and in which function. I certainly don’t wish him bad. And we need to give each other credit. There are not many team principals who have done what he has done.<\/p>\n “I see a situation that whatever happens, whatever outcomes there may be, whether he comes back to Formula 1 or not, I am at ease with it.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mar 30, 2026, 07:21 AM ET Toto Wolff has cast doubt over Christian Horner’s return to Formula 1…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":570623,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[49,48,578,576,577,82],"class_list":["post-570622","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570622","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=570622"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570622\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/570623"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=570622"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=570622"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=570622"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
– Max Verstappen considering retiring from F1 at end of 2026<\/a><\/p>\n