Toto Wolff meets with Nyck de Vries as ‘Mercedes spy returns from Red Bull’

Nyck de Vries and Mercedes chief Toto Wolff were pictured having lunch together at a Monaco cafe following the Dutchman’s sacking as a driver for AlphaTauri on Tuesday. De Vries spent less than a year with AlphaTauri after failing to impress Helmut Marko at Red Bull, who was overseeing his development.

Given De Vries’ brief and unremarkable stint with Red Bull’s sister team, many fans have speculated whether he had simply been sent to spy on the reigning constructor champions for Mercedes, who he had previously been a reserve driver for before the move to AlphaTauri. 

Reddit threads were filled with conspiracies from fans about the nature of De Vries’s meeting with Wolff. One user wrote: “The Toto masterplan: send Nyck in to spy on RB, and then take him back with insider knowledge.”

While another (@Haunting_Goal6417) quipped: “RedBull masterplan is sending him back with Alpha Tauri knowledge. ‘We taught him wrong, as a joke’.” A third (@blackbalt89) added: “Toto: ‘So, vat did you learn of the inner workings of Red Bull?’.”

And a fourth user (@plmatt91) posted: “Now hear me out… What if Toto planted Nyck as a mole within RB and this was all a plan that completely backfired in the end!” 

De Vries, a former F2 champion, departs AlphaTauri without a single point to his name from 10 races and had already received a warning from Marko earlier in the season that his position was at risk. “We spoke to De Vries and he agrees with us, he needs to improve,” Marko said. “The gap to team-mate Yuki Tsunoda, who is doing a great job, is too big.

“To use footballer jargon, Nick has a yellow card but not the red one yet. If he improves, a driver change will not be an issue.”

He added: “If the worst came to the worst, we would fall back on our pool of young talent. It’s specifically about Liam Lawson and Ayumu Iwasa. Ricciardo is not an issue.”Red Bull reserve Daniel Ricciardo has since been chosen to replace De Vries at AlphaTauri on loan.

“I’m very pleased to welcome Daniel back into the team,” AlphaTauri team principal Franz Tost said. “There’s no doubt about his driving skills, and he already knows many of us, so his integration will be easy and straightforward. The team will also profit a lot from his experience, as he is an eight-time Formula 1 Grand Prix winner.”