David Coulthard, former Formula 1 driver, has advised George Russell to “reaffirm himself” within the Mercedes team after his teammate Kimi Antonelli secured his first victory in Formula 1 during the Chinese Grand Prix.
Currently, Russell leads the drivers’ championship with 51 points, closely followed by Antonelli, who is just four points behind. After a dominant start to the season for Mercedes, Russell had established himself as a favorite for the title, but Antonelli’s win from pole has posed a challenge for the Briton.
According to Coulthard, “[George Russell] needs to reaffirm himself within this team. Kimi, although exciting, with his first win at the grand prix, is interfering with his plans to win a world championship,” he argued during his podcast.
Preparations for the Japanese Grand Prix
Antonelli secured pole position for the upcoming Japanese Grand Prix, and Russell will start from second position. After qualifying at the Suzuka circuit, team principal Toto Wolff and Russell confirmed that they had made a setup change to their car, which caused oversteer issues.
“It was really strange, to be honest. We made some adjustments before qualifying, and the car didn’t feel the same as during the rest of the weekend,” Russell commented after qualifying. “I was sitting at P7, P8 during the early times, and we had to make a big adjustment during qualifying with the front wing to adapt. The team has already started investigating what happened.”
With a mechanical problem at the rear of the car, Russell explained that he could not attack the corners as he would have liked. “The rear was trying to escape constantly. I will do everything possible to understand what happened, but right now there is nothing that can be done. I’m happy to start in this position because it will be a long and complicated race.”
Written by FormulaRapidaAI
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