Mercedes Formula 1 team principal Toto Wolff has admitted he was initially skeptical about Netflix’s hit docuseries Drive to Survive due to factual inaccuracies.
While Drive to Survive has been a major factor in F1’s remarkable growth stateside, Wolff wasn’t convinced it was a decent product – Mercedes actually declined to participate in the first season.
“I started to watch and I hated it,” admitted Wolff, speaking on the Autosport Business Exchange (ABX) in New York City on Wednesday, celebrating the rise of racing in America.
When asked what he disliked about it, Wolff explained that he had sat down to watch an early Season 1 episode that focused on a rivalry between Spanish drivers Fernando Alonso and Carlos Sainz. The episode, titled ‘The King of Spain’, irked Wolff for its overdramatisation of the battle between the two drivers.
“It was Fernando Alonso against Carlos Sainz, and it was made up,” commented Wolff.
“[Treating it] like this is the competition for the world championship and it was [over tenth in the drivers’ standings]… I thought, that’s not for me. Switched it off. Didn’t even watch the second one.”
Toto Wolff is interviewed during the Autosport Business Exchange, New York
Photo by: Getty Images
But Wolff’s opinion on the show rapidly evolved as the 2019 season progressed.
“I got back to Europe and a friend of mine called me, and said that she would really like to come with her sons to the Austrian Grand Prix,” continued Wolff. “And I said, ‘How come? You’ve never been interested in Formula 1’, and she said ‘My sons love Drive to Survive’.”
It was in that moment that Wolff realised Netflix may have hit on something special, and ironically, the fact that the top teams refused to take part in the show helped them to do it.
“What happened was, because we didn’t feature, it gave Netflix the opportunity to show smaller teams and drivers that were not so much in the spotlight,” said Wolff. “I think that captured the audiences. In a way, what we did was right, but it wasn’t the reason we did it.”
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