Toto Wolff has always been a person who wants to be at the very top of whatever he is doing. His competitive nature and passion for winning as a team boss are extremely well-known amongst F1 fans. However, even during his time as a racer, Wolff wanted to lead the charts and indulged in a very dangerous stunt that almost got him killed in 2009, 4 years before he joined Mercedes. Now, as quoted by Wolff has revealed that he went ahead with his stunt even after receiving a warning from Niki Lauda. Advertisement The whole issue was a result of , a track nicknamed the ‘Green Hell’ because of how dangerous it is. However, was determined to etch his name into racing history by beating the then-existing record of 7:07 by Sabine Schmitz. Advertisement When attempting the record, Wolff managed to beat it during a test lap when he recorded a lap time of 7:03. However, that wasn’t enough and the Austrian wanted to get in a sub-seven minute lap, and that is where things went wrong. During his fastest lap, shunting the car off into the crash barrier. Wolff suffered multiple concussions and vertebral injuries due to the 27G crash. The warning that went unheard 14 years down the line, Wolff appeared on BBC’s Desert Island Discs, where he revealed that Niki Lauda warned him, to not go ahead with his lap record attempt. As reported by , Wolff recalls Lauda telling him that going for the fastest lap at Nordschleife might be life threatening. Loading embed tweet https://twitter.com/aut0mob/status/1628332307634348032?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw Toto Wolff said, “ .” However, Wolff didn’t listen to Lauda. He put himself in a very difficult situation, and was lucky to not suffer any life-threatening injuries. Advertisement Toto Wolff was lucky not to be another Niki Lauda Lauda himself was involved in one of the most horrific crashes ever in the Nordschleife. During the 1976 German GP, Lauda lost control of his car on lap 2, which went on to hit the crash barrier and then burst into flames. Unfortunately, the Austrian driver was stuck inside the cockpit. Loading embed tweet https://twitter.com/JunaidSamodien_/status/1039786282438873088?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw Lauda suffered major burns on his face and slipped into a coma following the crash. His recovery from the accident is often hailed as one of the bravest comebacks in F1 history. In fact, he returned to racing action just four-weeks later in Monza. Even though Wolff did not pay heed to Lauda’s warning, the current Mercedes team principal was extremely lucky that his crash was not as bad as Lauda’s. Advertisement