George Russell said qualifying for the Belgian Grand Prix confirmed his current deficit to teammate Kimi Antonelli is not down to his driving style, but differences in how their Mercedes cars are deploying power.
While championship leader Antonelli breezed to pole position at Spa-Francorchamps, Russell was half a second slower in the other car, qualifying fourth for Sunday’s race.
The English driver came into the weekend saying he was likely make changes to his driving style to see if his recent struggle to match Antonelli had been down to that.
“That’s what we thought, coming out of Silverstone, we thought it was in the driving style and technique but we’ve finally concluded it’s not and, you know, we’ve changed everything,” Russell said on Saturday.
F1’s controversial new cars require a certain style of driving to maximise the way power is harvested around a lap -- drivers then deploy it later on.
Belgium’s famous circuit is one of the most extreme for the energy harvesting required with F1’s new cars. Russell claimed the majority of his gap to Antonelli on Saturday came when the car was deploying energy.
“It was four tenths in the straights in Q3 and you know it’s frustrating every single lap I’ve come in this weekend seeing anywhere from two-tenths [of a second] to four-tenths or five. In FP2 yesterday it was seven-tenths.
“The team are working so hard to understand what it is. We saw it as early as Austria actually, we saw signs but we always thought there was a reason. Sprint qualifying in Silverstone, we saw 3.5 tenths loss. We thought we found the problem.
“So we keep going through this process of, oh, we think it’s this, we change it, oh it’s not this, maybe it’s the driving style. I thought it was the driving style. Honestly, I came into this weekend, I said on Thursday, I think it’s the driving style. Changed the driving style, it’s not the driving style. As I said, the team are working super hard to understand what it is.”
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Speaking to F1 TV after the session, Mercedes boss Toto Wolff confirmed the issue.
“George is obviously suffering from a lack of straight line speed which we are unable to explain. A couple of tenths, we’ve literally left no stone unturned,” he said.
Wolff did point out that Russell was still not on top of the overall package as well as Antonelli. He added: “We will see on the next tracks because they will be less energy starved so it doesn’t make a big difference, and then there’s a few tenths that George needs to find.
“Lots of it he has already found, but over a few corners there’s still two tenths or two-and-a-half tenths, so overall he has recovered well but at the moment he doesn’t gel with the car and he hasn’t for the last two weekends.
“That’s probably not his fault, but we just need to bring it together.”
Despite the ongoing struggle to understand the gap, Russell sounded confident he can get himself in the mix for victory on Sunday. “For sure,” he said when asked if he can still win the race.
“Anything can happen. “Truth is, battling against my teammate who is such an incredible driver, doing such a great job at the moment, in the best of times, is a tall order.
“But I feel confident head-to-head, I can achieve it. But when it feels like you’re battling with one hand behind your back, it’s a challenge.
“We had the issue in Silverstone, and we ended up P2 on the podium. So I pray, I’m going to try and endure the pain of this issue tomorrow, and hope for a great result, and try and find a solution for next week.”
Russell is 25 points behind Antonelli, having been 68 back after the Monaco Grand Prix.
