George Russell, after a promising start at the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix, suddenly saw one driver after another overtake him. The Brit dropped from third place to a seventh-place finish, unable to keep up with the cars at the front of the field. This was surprising, given that Russell had secured a top-five finish in all other races of the season so far. According to the driver, an old problem with Mercedes is rearing its head again: ‘The trend is quite clear.’
George Russell described the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix as a ‘disastrous’ race after he failed to finish higher than seventh place. This result also ended his streak of top-five finishes. Despite qualifying third, Russell attributed the disappointing Sunday primarily to the warm temperatures.
“We certainly weren’t unlucky, we were just agonizingly slow,” Russell explains to Sky F1. “I mean, the trend is quite clear: when it’s warm, we’re slow, when it’s cold, we’re fast, and that was the case last year as well.” According to the Brit, the problem goes beyond a simple adjustment to the settings. “There’s clearly a more fundamental issue with the car. It’s not the first race of the season where we were slower than Charles Leclerc, and even slower than Williams, but we managed to pull a result out of the bag on previous occasions. But in Imola, we were frankly very lucky to get seventh place.”
Fundamental Problem
Russell reveals that the problems on Sunday in Emilia-Romagna even started during the formation lap. “It was very strange,” the driver continues. “During the laps to the grid, I already thought something was wrong. The team looked around thoroughly and saw nothing, but that feeling persisted for about sixty laps. We have a fundamental problem, because either the front wheels are overheating, or the rear wheels are overheating, from circuit to circuit.”
According to Russell, however, the problem has been known to Mercedes for some time, but the Silver Arrows were still able to achieve good results at the start of the season. “It’s not the first time we’ve reported it. So it was probably just the first time all our rivals had a semi-decent race,” concludes the Brit.
