George Russell has been handed a clear verdict by Formula 1 fans that he must be more ruthless against Kimi Antonelli.\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
according to a recent RacingNews365 poll, 59 per cent have suggesting the 19-year-old Italian represents a genuine threat to the Briton’s status at Mercedes.\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
The numbers tell a striking story. After four rounds of the 2026 season, Antonelli leads the drivers’ championship with 100 points, a commanding 20-point advantage over Russell.\u00a0\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
The teenager has claimed three victories and three pole positions, delivering the strongest points-scoring start to a season in a decade.\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Russell’s sole win came in the opening round at Melbourne, where he beat Antonelli by just under three seconds.\u00a0\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Since then, the experienced Briton has managed only a second-place finish in China and fourth-place results in Japan and Miami, whilst his teammate has dominated proceedings with consecutive victories.\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Just 34 per cent of respondents believe Russell’s experience will ultimately prevail, with seven per cent remaining undecided.\u00a0\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
The poll results reflect a growing sentiment that Russell, at 28 years old and still chasing his first world championship, faces the sternest challenge of his career from a teammate who appears increasingly comfortable in his second season of Formula 1.\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"George Russell has been handed a clear verdict by Formula 1 fans that he must be more ruthless…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":673553,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,827,830,828,831,829,826,813,823,825,806,805,824,803,804,822,85],"class_list":["post-673552","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-daniel-ricciardo","tag-f1-calendar","tag-f1-live","tag-f1-results","tag-f1-standings","tag-ferrari","tag-formula-1","tag-lewis-hamilton","tag-max-verstappen","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motorsport","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-racing","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/673552","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=673552"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/673552\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/673553"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=673552"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=673552"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=673552"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}