Ross Brawn muddies water over his Mercedes future

Ross Brawn, the Mercedes team principal, attempted to clarify his position with the German team yesterday but in the end his message was not at all clear. While Brawn said he will remain in charge at Mercedes for the immediate future and dismissed reports that Paddy Lowe, McLaren's technical director, is about to join the German team, he later suggested Lowe would be in the frame if he decided to leave.

"I am the team principal and I'm in charge of sporting, technical and racing matters. Paddy Lowe is not coming," the 58-year-old initially said at the team's Brackley headquarters as he welcomed Lewis Hamilton on the driver's first official day with his new team since leaving McLaren.

The occasion was overshadowed by the earlier reports that suggested Brawn and CEO, Nick Fry, could be leaving – and Lowe coming – following the recent appointment of Toto Wolff as Mercedes' motorsport chief. And Brawn's defiant stance seemed to fall apart when he said: "There are a lot of new ingredients in the team. And they need to settle down. So I want to see how things go before I make a final long-term commitment. If I choose to leave the team then Paddy will come. We have a fall-back plan. It's as simple as that."

But that does not sound simple at all. What Brawn is saying is that he will remain at Mercedes as long as he stays. And that clearly means that there is a power struggle that is more competitive than anything Mercedes have managed on the track – they have won one race in three years since their latest incarnation. That struggle is between Wolff and the new non-executive chairman, Niki Lauda, who want Lowe, and Brawn. Reports that Fry could be leaving were dismissed, rather unconvincingly, by Brawn, when he said: "Nick is still very much involved. All the changes will have an impact but he'll certainly be here for a while."

Perhaps the real problem at Mercedes is the numbers at the top. They have been recruiting strongly for a couple of years and until recently had five former technical directors on their books, in Brawn, Bob Bell, Aldo Costa, Geoff Willis and Loïc Bigois. The first four are still there. And, now, so is Wolff and the non-executive chairman Lauda. And Brawn and Fry are going nowhere. At least, not yet.

Brawn added: "Part of the request from Mercedes was a much longer-term commitment from me and I said I wanted to do that. I really want to do that. But let's just see how things settle down for a while."

About Hamilton, Brawn said: "What I see is a real passion, a rawness about the way he approaches things. He's very face-on, he says what he thinks, which is great. But he's also very respectful. So all the signs are positive.

"We know about the talent and we know about the speed. Lewis said to me that it was very exciting to be working with me, which was great motivation for me."
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