George Russell 'disappointed' about not being a race winner with Mercedes yet

Russell was promoted to a racing seat with the Silver Arrows for 2022 after learning the ropes in Formula 1 with Williams for three seasons.

George Russell in a file photo. (Twitter: @GeorgeRussell63)
By Nilavro Ghosh | Jun 7, 2022 | 3 Min Read follow icon Follow Us

George Russell is “disappointed” because he has yet to win a race with Mercedes after seven rounds of the 2022 season. Russell was promoted to a racing seat with the Silver Arrows for 2022 after learning the ropes in Formula 1 with Williams for three seasons. He was filling the most interesting position on the grid at the time, with Mercedes having won seven Constructors’ titles in a row, which had increased to eight by the end of the 2021 season. However, Mercedes has struggled to get off the ground in 2022 as a result of the regulatory changes, with Russell’s best finish so far being P3 at the Australian and Spanish Grands Prix. Russell admits that at this point in the season, he had hoped to have already climbed to the top of the Formula One podium.

“I think if you had told me before the season that we’d be seven races in and I wouldn’t have a victory to my name, I would have definitely been a bit disappointed with that,” Russell told reporters. “But I think given the pace of the car and given where we’ve been as a team, I’ve been reasonably pleased with how I’ve performed. I think the results have been maximised. I don’t see many races where we could have achieved better results.”

‘Room to improve’

Russell, on the other hand, is encouraging his Mercedes team to improve, as Red Bull and Ferrari have pulled away to form a two-team title fight. Mercedes is 101 points behind Red Bull in the Constructors’ Championship heading into the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, while Max Verstappen leads Russell by 41 points in the Drivers’ standings. Russell hasn’t given up hope of winning the title in 2022, either.

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“We’ve definitely got room to improve,” Russell stated. “You are constantly striving for more when you understand the car more, the tyres more. And I want to fight for this championship. But as a team, we just need to keep on pushing – I need to keep pushing personally. So, more to come.”

The Baku challenge

The Monaco Grand Prix was a setback for Mercedes after a significant stride forward in Spain, with the team trying to make the W13 a comfortable ride over the slow, tight, and bumpy streets of Monte Carlo. The next stop is a street circuit, but Baku is not a low-speed event like Monaco. Nonetheless, Mercedes’ trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin anticipates Baku to provide some issues comparable to Monaco, stating that the team must seek to increase the W13’s operational window.

“Baku might present some similar challenges,” he stated. “We are working on areas though to try and improve that ride, try and be able to run the car a bit closer to its optimum window, but we are well aware that in addition to adding base performance to the car we have to make it work over a wider range of circuits. These are all things we are busy with in preparation for Baku but also longer term, because there are other challenging tracks that will come up.”