George Russell might look back on winning Saturday's Azerbaijan Grand Prix as a breakthrough moment in his 2026 season. That's not to say it will be a turning point in his title fight with teammate Kimi Antonelli -- by his own admission, Russell's championship chances hang by no more than a thread -- but instead the moment in which he was rewarded for keeping the faith in his own ability.
The 2026 Formula 1 season to date has been a bruising one for the Mercedes driver. After going into the year as the title favorite, it quickly became apparent that his more junior teammate held the edge in terms of outright performance. For a handful of races, Russell was able to blame bad luck -- which was undoubtedly present at a number of races, including Japan, Canada and Monaco -- but by the summer break it was increasingly clear that Antonelli's growing lead in the championship was built more on outright performance than random circumstance.
By that point of the year, and to his credit, Russell had recognized his own shortcomings. He returned from F1's month-long summer break knowing he would have to make changes to his driving style, no matter how uncomfortable they might feel. Under the previous set of regulations, which smothered the cars in downforce, Russell's high-commitment, high-entry-speed approach to corners was rewarded with a car that could meet his demands.
Arguably, it not only gave him the edge over Antonelli during the Italian's rookie season, but also over his previous Mercedes teammate, seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton. The only downside was that Mercedes' engineers never truly got their collective heads around the previous set of regulations to provide Russell with a car capable of using those inherent strengths to fight for the title.
The introduction of a new formula this year -- one with less downforce, narrower tires and the added complication of managing electrical energy around the lap -- has seen Mercedes return to the front of the grid, but Russell's natural driving style fail to sync. As recently as Wednesday's news conference in Baku, Russell admitted Antonelli, who is typically later on the brakes and more comfortable in reacting to the car's movement underneath him, had "the perfect driving style for these cars," whereas his "isn't working as well."
The difference in performance between Russell and Antonelli has been particularly marked over a race distance this year. Antonelli can eke more performance from the tires over their lifespan, whereas Russell's pace has tended to drop off over a race distance -- even at circuits where he has been a match for his teammate in qualifying.
As Russell has pointed out multiple times in the past few races, Formula 1 is not like tennis or golf where an athlete can spend endless hours training away from a competitive environment to hone their technique. The only opportunity Russell has had to adapt his driving style to his 2026 Mercedes is during races, and it became his main focus every time he got behind the wheel.
"It feels great, to be honest," he said of victory in Baku. "I'm very proud of the resilience that I and my close group of engineers have shown during the tough periods this year because there's been a lot of hard work to overcome some of the challenges, to adapt my driving style to suit this new car better.
"And F1 is so tough, you don't get opportunities to practice this, and finally it's coming to me a bit more intuitively than it once did, and I'm gaining confidence. And especially on circuits like this, it just allows you to eke out that little bit more on the brakes, get that little bit closer to the walls, and it's been a flawless weekend."
The challenge facing Russell in recent races has not only been technical, but also mental. While Russell has been working on making changes to his driving style after the summer break, Antonelli has extended his lead in the championship with victories at Monza and the Madring.
It would have been easy to lose heart as Russell's title hopes slipped beyond his grasp, but he continued to believe in his underlying potential to return to the top step of the podium.
"I think I never lost that faith in myself, even through tough moments I knew there was a reason why I was off the pace," he said. "It wasn't like I just suddenly forgot how to drive, and I knew I would be able to find it again. I just had to be patient. So, I feel confident. You know, it's been four races since the break. I've been on the front row in three of them, three podiums from the four races. I feel I can fight for victory week in, week out now."
For all Russell's evident progress in Baku, there was one thing that was missing from Saturday's victory: a competitive Antonelli to measure himself against.
After a hydraulic issue curtailed his Thursday practice sessions in Azerbaijan, Antonelli never seemed to hit his stride around the street circuit this weekend. In what appeared to be an attempt to overcompensate for his lack of performance, he clipped the barrier at Turn 1 on his second hot lap in qualifying, which ruled him out of the rest of the session and left him 16th on the grid for Saturday's race.
Starting so far back in the pack, the championship leader opted not to push the limits in the race, and his restraint was rewarded with 10 points for a fifth-place finish.
"This weekend was my worst of the year by far in terms of performance," Antonelli said after the race. "I wasn't there. I wasn't really present, especially with what happened so early on, and just didn't take the same risks, especially after qualifying. Today was more 'damage-safe mode' instead of full attack."
Driving in any kind of "safe mode" is not in Antonelli's DNA and it is incredibly unlikely Russell will come up against a similarly uncompetitive version of his teammate again this season. It's the main reason why Russell's Baku victory should not be seen as a turning point in the championship, and is better viewed as a step in his own progress toward a more competitive version of himself for the remainder of this season and 2027.
How big that step truly is will likely become clear as Antonelli gets back up to speed at the variety of circuit types that make up the rest of the season. It was notable that, prior to Baku, Russell had often drawn parallels between his struggles and those of McLaren's Oscar Piastri, who, just like Russell, has been outperformed by his teammate since the introduction of the 2026 regulations.
"I think Oscar and I have been dealing with similar sort of struggles this year," Russell said on Wednesday. "The car is very different, the tires are different, power unit aside, and what's probably worked so well in the past for the two of us, and maybe a couple of other drivers on the grid, this year isn't working as well."
It's perhaps no coincidence, then, that up until his lap-40 mistake at Turn 1, Piastri was trending toward one of his best performances of the season in Baku. Could it be that the same driving style traits that have limited Piastri and Russell so often this year were in some way less restrictive around one of F1's most notorious outlier circuits? Or that the driving styles that have served Antonelli and Lando Norris so well elsewhere this year were in some way neutered this weekend? The return of a more conventional circuit in Malaysia's Sepang next weekend will likely hold the answer.
In the meantime, however, Russell deserves to revel in his success. The triple achievement of pole position, victory and fastest lap -- known as a grand slam in racing circles -- doesn't come along very often in a Formula 1 career and is always proof of a weekend spent at the top of a driver's game.
"I think it's probably my first grand slam in Formula 1 and, for sure, the most dominant weekend I've had in my career," Russell said. "So that has come at a really great moment.
"And also to achieve it on a circuit that requires so much commitment and confidence, I'm really proud of because I think it would have been very easy for me to lose the faith this season. Not necessarily about winning the championship, but in terms of my ability, and that never happened."
