Mercedes boss Toto Wolff feared for his life in horror crash after 'dumb' stunt

23 August 2023 , 09:33

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Mercedes chief Toto Wolff (Image: Lynne Sladky/AP/REX/Shutterstock)

Mercedes chief Toto Wolff has opened up about the day he almost died attempting to break the lap record at the Nurburgring in 2009.

Before Wolff joined Mercedes in 2013 and helped them win seven double world championships as team principal, the Austrian was a driver himself. And in April 2009 he attempted to set a new lap record at the Nurburgring's Nordschleife in a Porsche 911 RSR.

However, the attempt went horribly wrong when the car's right rear tyre exploded while going 189mph. The result was a horrific crash which saw Wolff smash into multiple crash barriers on an uphill section of the course.

The car eventually stopped near the next chicane and, while Wolff has no memory of what happened, an onboard camera recorded him turning off the engine and getting out of the car before collapsing.

Opening up about the incident in an appearance on BBC radio show Desert Island Discs, Wolff said: "They found me lying on the grass behind the crash barrier with my helmet on and I thought I was dead.

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"The first memory that came back was in the ambulance when I felt a strange tingling sensation in my legs. I thought it would end in paralysis." Wolff was close with the late great Niki Lauda, the cousin of his ex-wife, who almost died in a fiery crash at the Nurburgring in 1976.

Lauda was lucky to survive his crash and was left with severe burns to his head and hands. And when Wolff informed Lauda of what he planned to do at the same course over 30-years later, he warned him not to go through with it.

Niki Lauda warned Wolff he could die attempting to break the record (PA)

"It was really the dumbest idea of my life," Wolff admitted. "Niki had his bad accident where he almost died in the flames. He said to me, 'Don't be so stupid. Nobody cares about the lap time on the Nordschleife. You could kill yourself. Look at me.'"

Wolff also opened up about his mental health during the interview, revealing he has suffered from depression and anxiety. "I felt that when I suffered from these episodes in the past that high performers didn't have that, and it made me suffer even more because I thought, 'I'm not going to be able to be best in what I do because I have those bad moments'," he said.

"Today I don't have any insecurity any more about myself. I don't perceive myself at all as powerless. At the end of the day, what I want to say is, 'Even strong men and women, people who are successful in the public eye suffer. That's why you can suffer. It's allowed and I want to help to take that stigma away because you can achieve anything in the world, even though you have these moments'."

Matthew Cooper