31/07/2016
NEWS STORY
Since the last German Grand Prix in 2014, which Mercedes won, the German manufacturer has pretty much cleaned up, consequently there is much anticipation ahead of today's race which will be attended by the company's executives and their special guests.
However, despite the clashes in Spain and Austria, and Turn 1 here having a notorious reputation, Toto Wolff is not calling on his drivers to act any differently than they would at any other race.
"Everything is televised to millions of people, almost every race is the same," he told reporters. "It doesn't get much worse than Barcelona, where the board was present, and after just 60 seconds we had to answer the question 'what are we doing for the next 90 minutes'. So I wouldn't say there is extra pressure. It's pretty much the same everywhere.
"I'm confident, because we have talked about it a lot, what the consequence would be. And that hasn't changed," he added. "As a driver it's clear that they wouldn't want to make a statement before the race that they are aware that they shouldn't be crashing, that would be giving too much away. But they are aware.
"Our guidelines are designed to prevent incidents that cost us points and we haven't had any incidents since then," he said, referring to Barcelona. "So whatever the behaviour is or the pattern is during the build-up to the race weekend, it doesn't really matter. It's important that on a Sunday those rules are being followed.
"Silverstone was pretty straightforward and Hungary was pretty straightforward, so I have positive indications that the message has arrived."
Check out our Sunday gallery from Hockenheim, here.