Vettel rumours are bull**** says Lauda

If you ever want to skip the rumour and conjecture your best bet is to always go directly to Niki Lauda.

The straight talking Austrian is never shy in coming forward to give his opinion or speak the truth and the Mercedes non-executive chairman did exactly that during the weekend of the Hungarian Grand Prix.

In the build up to last weekends race the rumour mill had suggested that Red Bull Racing were bracing themselves as two of their big rivals had reportedly made approaches for four-time Formula One World Champion Sebastian Vettel.

The 27-year-old German is reportedly sitting on a lucrative long-term contract with the Milton Keynes based outfit, however it is thought his Red Bull Racing contract holds a performance related get-out clause.

According to Red Bull’s Dr Helmut Marko, McLaren had made an ‘outrageously’ high offer for Vettel to join the team from 2016 onwards, whilst reports also linked Mercedes with an approach with a view to replacing Lewis Hamilton at the end of his current contract.

‘Of course they target him,’ Marko added.

What added fuel to Mercedes fire [pun intended] was despite having both Rosberg and Hamilton duelling for the 2014 Formula One World Championship Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff decided against denying the rumours and was quoted as saying by German motorsport publication Sport Bild: ‘This world is too competitive to want to go into our plans in the public, We are talking about a handful of top drivers. All the best teams fight over them.

‘We try to build a picture of how the market moves until we come to our decisions,’

Lewis Hamilton himself had to field questions as he landed in Hungary ahead of the practice sessions and whilst he made it clear that he would like to remain with Mercedes he added: ‘If they happen to want someone else that’s the way it is. I’m not going to whinge about it.

But in one foul [worded] swoop the rumour mill was shut down once the media approached Lauda on the subject.

‘Absolute bulls**t. I can tell you that nobody from this team had spoken with him. Why would we want to? We already have the two best drivers. Why would we want to change that?’ he said according to quotes on PlanetF1.com.