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George Russell sent a rejection email to Toto Wolff before becoming Mercedes' lead driver. A decade ago, as he excelled in feeder categories, Russell was approached by numerous parties higher up the motorsport ladder.

Wolff, then in the early days of his stewardship of Mercedes' single-seater activities, including Formula 1, was among the figures to approach the British driver. At the time, Russell was driving in the European Formula 3 series but looking to move up to Formula 3. Despite extensive talks with Wolff, he decided to sign with British team Carlin, who had Volkswagen backing. He also turned down "a lot of money" to join the BMW racing programme, which Russell says would have ruled out a future Mercedes move. Prior to moving from Williams to partner Lewis Hamilton at Mercedes in 2022, he told Motorsport Magazine: "I was already having conversations with Toto and Mercedes prior to joining Carlin and Volkswagen.

"I actually had a deal on the table to have almost the same backing from Mercedes as I had from Volkswagen. But because there wasn't an opportunity open at PREMA [the team with Mercedes links], the next team I would have had to join would be a German team called Mucke Motorsport, who I felt, for my first season F3, wouldn't be as well suited to me as a British team in Carlin."

Russell declined Wolff's offer in a polite email but suspected their paths would cross again, although he received a curt response from his future boss. Russell added: "So after my meeting with Toto at the start of 2015, I sent him an email just to say, 'I really appreciate the meeting and thanks for all of your advice. Just to let you know, I'll actually be joining Carlin and Volkswagen as opposed to Mücke Motorsport and Mercedes because I believe it's better for my career.'

"And I had the opinion that if I went out and did a good job, Mercedes would still be interested. So he replied back, 'I think you're making a wrong decision but let's stay in touch and let's see where we go from there.'"

Russell and Wolff only had to wait two years before they were working together, as the youngster joined Mercedes' junior driver programme in 2017. Wolff then played a key role in Russell stepping up to F1 with Mercedes engine partner Williams in 2019. He memorably made a one-off Mercedes appearance at the 2020 Sakhir Grand Prix after Lewis Hamilton was sidelined by Covid.

Russell almost beat team-mate Valtteri Bottas to pole and was on course for victory in the race until a Mercedes pitstop blunder. He eventually joined the team full-time in 2022 and has four wins to his name, the last of which came at the recent Canadian Grand Prix.

Despite his excellent 2025 form, there is speculation he could be replaced by Max Verstappen, with Wolff openly courting the four-time world champion. However, Russell has no issue with his team's interest in his arch-rival.

Speaking ahead of this weekend's Austrian Grand Prix, Russell said: "Why wouldn't teams be interested in Max? If every driver had no contracts for next year, Max would be No.1 for every single team. And that's understandable."