Toto Wolff claims he and Lewis Hamilton did not talk to each other for a while after Nico Rosberg beat the Brit to the title in 2016

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff said this week that he and Lewis Hamilton did not talk to each other for weeks after the latter's intense title battle with teammate Nico Rosberg. The 2016 season saw one of the most intense rivalries developing between drivers from the same team in recent history.

For three years, Hamilton and Rosberg went hammer-and-tongs against each other, which eventually led to the latter's retirement in 2016 and the souring of the duo's childhood friendship after the seven-time world champion could not prevent the German driver from notching his first and only title in F1 that year.

During his appearance on the "High Performance" podcast, Wolff spoke about learning "constant self-development" from Lewis Hamilton while telling the tale of the silence between the two in the weeks after the 2016 Abu Dhabi GP. Asked what he had learnt from Hamilton, Wolff said,

"The constant self-development, not only in the professional function [...] but also how he embraced this personal change. There was a moment when we had a really difficult time in 2016, after Nico won the race and the championship, and we didn't talk to each other for a few weeks.

"Then he came to my home because I said, 'we have to talk,' and we spent many hours and we came out of this discussion, it was before the Christmas party, so strong. That was the foundation of our friendship and relationship in the years to come" (1:00:00).

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Mercedes team boss says he "saw Lewis Hamilton's exit coming"

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff claimed that he got to know of rumors of Lewis Hamilton's exit from Mercedes from Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz's father, among many messages from drivers' fathers.

Speaking on the "High Performance" podcast, the Austrian said that he saw the move "coming". He said,

“I heard the bells ringing two weeks before [...] The old man Sainz called me and said, 'this is what’s happening.' And then there were a few drivers’ dads rang me up that didn’t before. So I thought, 'Okay…there’s something going on there.' Then I sent a text to Fred Vasseur saying: ‘You’re taking our driver?’ Didn’t get any response. Very unusual for Fred. He’s a good friend. So yeah, I saw it coming.

"But then obviously, when Lewis arrived in the house, like he did so many years before, we had a bit of small talk like we always do, about Christmas holidays and all of that. I said, ‘We’re recruiting from Ferrari now, we’ve got this guy,’ and Lewis was, ‘Ooh, there’s something I need to tell you’" (1:30).

Wolff said he was left taken aback at first by Lewis Hamilton's decision as he couldn't "imagine [him] anywhere else than Mercedes." However, he quickly accepted the reality and saw the whole situation as an "opportunity".

After months of speculation following the announcement of Hamilton's move to Ferrari, the Brackley-based outfit announced that its junior driver Kimi Antonelli would replace Lewis Hamilton next year to race alongside George Russell.