Toto Wolff reveals heartbreaking phone call about Lewis Hamilton's bike accident

Lewis Hamilton’s Ferrari move was a heartbreak for Mercedes fans and boss Toto Wolff. But this is not new for Toto, because the 7-time world champion has given many of those in his 12-year journey with the team. Hamilton has done many shocking things to Toto Wolff and the Austrian recently opened up about one of those big incidents. Toto revealed that during one time, Lewis vanished into nowhere and he couldn't reach him through phone calls. After two days he was told Hamilton was met with an accident in Jerez and was shocked to hear that news.

Sir Lewis Hamilton is a champion racer as everyone knows. However, his hunger for learning new things and improving has led him to a big accident in Jerez. The British driver was very fond of bike racing especially MotoGP. He also expressed interest in buying a MotoGP team for himself and there are still talks about that. He even swapped his Mercedes car with MotoGP legend Valentino Rossi.

Jump on board with motorsport legends @LewisHamilton & @ValeYellow46 as they swap rides! 🤘 #LH44VR46

Check out the full POV laps here: https://t.co/rBhBC1MCRX@MercedesAMGF1@YamahaMotoGP#F1#MotoGPpic.twitter.com/ZVY09NNdTF

— Monster Energy (@MonsterEnergy) December 19, 2019

His interest in bike racing reached a boiling point and he eloped with Williams Team principal James Vowels who was Mercedes's head of strategy then and his race engineer Peter Bonnington to Jerez. There he wanted to try the new Yamaha YZF-R1 MotoGP bike first hand.

F1 drivers are carefully taken care of by their team principals because many sponsors invest in teams only because of the drivers and talent. Lewis Hamilton is an exceptional talent, if anything happens to him it would spoil the whole Mercedes camp. He was not allowed to drive bikes, so he went to Jerez secretly with Vowels and Bonno. Lewis cut down all communications with Toto Wolff for two days as he felt his boss wouldn't agree to his desire to try a MotoGP bike.

A Heartbreaking Phone Call

🎥|| Toto Wolff about the time when Lewis Hamilton tested the Yamaha YZF-R1 Superbike.

"Secretly, they didn't tell me. They went testing in Jerez with my head of strategy and one of the engineer guys."

"I couldn't get hold of him for two days. And then calling Lewis, my… pic.twitter.com/dk3M2MZM9w

— sin ⁴⁴ (@44britcedes) January 17, 2025

Toto says “Secretly, they didnt tell me, they went testing Jerez with my head of strategy, who is also a keen motorbike guy, and one of the engineers. I couldn't get hold of him for two days. Then I called Lewis, and my engineer picked up and he said ‘It's all good, all is fine, we just finished biking, and just, whatever you hear, he’s all fine’. 

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I said, ‘What happened?’ and he replied ‘He fell’.” The Austrian was shocked hearing that and was heartbroken. He asked for more insights and learned about their secret plan to try a MotoGP bike at Jerez and the accident. The Boss says the Yamaha MotoGP bike was not for beginners as it was made for the MotoGP and Superbike riders. Hamilton wanted a nice lap time as he felt he was slower. 

But he was faster than most of the MotoGP rookies and he didn't realise that and started to compare himself with the Pros. His thirst for going fast led to an incident. Wolff added “He was four seconds off the MotoGP Pros only. No, it's unbelievable. The body feeling he has is what makes him a champion.”

The incident occurred during the 2018 Formula 1 season when Lewis Hamilton was in his prime form battling against Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel. Mercedes were also the most dominant team during that period and continued their dominance for two more seasons until 2020.

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