{"id":823194,"date":"2026-07-25T15:43:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-25T15:43:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/823194\/"},"modified":"2026-07-25T15:43:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-25T15:43:11","slug":"martin-brundle-predicts-strong-george-russell-comeback-amid-kimi-antonelli-threat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/823194\/","title":{"rendered":"Martin Brundle predicts strong George Russell comeback amid Kimi Antonelli threat"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Sky Sports F1 commentator and former driver <a href=\"https:\/\/www.motorsport.com\/driver\/martin-brundle\/585\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Martin Brundle<\/a> has firmly backed <a href=\"https:\/\/www.motorsport.com\/driver\/george-russell\/21167\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">George Russell<\/a> to bounce back from his recent run of misfortune, even as he faces intense pressure from his team-mate.<\/p>\n<p>Brundle weighed in on Russell&#8217;s ongoing on-track challenges, noting that the current Formula 1 machinery remains difficult to understand.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;They\u2019re quirky cars to fully understand. It\u2019s George who summed it up best for me when he said he was like a golfer having to learn a completely new swing,&#8221; Brundle explained during the Sky Sports F1 broadcast in Hungary.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;He\u2019s got nothing to lose now actually. He\u2019s had so much bad luck &#8211; wrong place, wrong time, whatever it is, I think he\u2019ll come back really strongly now.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>While Brundle remains confident that the engineering team will resolve the underlying technical issues hindering the car, he warned that the Briton still faces a challenge from his team-mate Kimi Antonelli. The Italian driver extended his lead in the drivers&#8217; championship with his sixth win of the season at the Belgian Grand Prix.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The team are going to find the issues, but the biggest problem he\u2019s got is that\u00a0Kimi is so relentlessly fast,&#8221; Brundle continued. &#8220;That\u2019s what he\u2019s got to work on now, because he can\u2019t do anything about the other stuff.&#8221;\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>   <img decoding=\"async\" draggable=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/1784994191_481_george-russell-mercedes.jpg\" alt=\"George Russell, Mercedes\" width=\"1200\" height=\"800\" loading=\"lazy\"\/> <\/p>\n<p class=\"title\">George Russell, Mercedes<\/p>\n<p class=\"photographer\">Photo by: Guido De Bortoli \/ LAT Images via Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>Looking ahead to this weekend&#8217;s Hungarian Grand Prix, Brundle expects a close battle between the top four teams &#8211; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.motorsport.com\/team\/mercedes\/5\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Mercedes<\/a>, Red Bull, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.motorsport.com\/team\/ferrari\/3\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Ferrari<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.motorsport.com\/team\/mclaren\/10\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">McLaren<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Most people in the paddock think that the Ferrari is actually the fastest car, but maybe not the fastest power unit combination,&#8221; he said. &#8220;It\u2019s all corners here; there\u2019s not a straight worth its name really, and the one we have got is dominated by the exit of the last corner anyway.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;So, Ferrari will be good, but so will Mercedes, so will Red Bull, and let\u2019s hope\u00a0McLaren are right in there as well.\u00a0They\u2019re really close, and I think getting closer, the top four teams.&#8221;\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Photos from Hungarian GP &#8211; Saturday<\/p>\n<p>            We want your opinion!<\/p>\n<p class=\"mt-auto\">What would you like to see on Motorsport.com?<\/p>\n<p>            <a href=\"#\" class=\"ms-link text-link font-bold\">Take our 5 minute survey.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"mt-1 text-body\">&#8211; The Motorsport.com Team<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sky Sports F1 commentator and former driver Martin Brundle has firmly backed George Russell to bounce back from&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":823195,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[64,63,817,813,816,3875,31147,31948,397175,945,85,1511],"class_list":["post-823194","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-george-russell","tag-hungarian-gp","tag-hungaroring","tag-martin-brundle-predicts-strong-george-russell-comeback-amid-kimi-antonelli-threat","tag-mercedes","tag-sports","tag-trendingteam"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/823194","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=823194"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/823194\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/823195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=823194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=823194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=823194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}