George Russell appeared to rule himself out of the fight for the Drivers’ Championship after Kimi Antonelli claimed his eighth win of the 2026 season in Madrid.<\/p>\n
The Briton fell short of his team mate’s result again, finishing in P5 in Sunday’s Spanish Grand Prix, as the result leaves him 81 points behind in the standings.<\/p>\n
After a strong start to the Spanish Grand Prix<\/a> weekend for the Briton, who topped the first practice session, that was as good as it got as he went on to qualify in P6 and was left questioning his pit stop strategy as Sunday’s race unfolded.<\/p>\n After coming home in fifth at the Madring, as his team mate backed up last weekend’s heroic home win in Monza with another, Russell appeared to rule himself out of being in contention for this year’s title amid Antonelli’s form.<\/p>\n “We\u2019re obviously in a great place to win the constructors\u2019,” he said. “Realistically, I\u2019m not in the fight for the drivers\u2019, and that just allows me to focus race by race and try to get some good results.”<\/p>\n Before the weekend began, the Briton had remarked that Antonelli “had done a better job<\/a>” but had insinuated he was still in the title fight, though he acknowledged he would need elements of luck to claw back the deficit.<\/p>\n However, that luck didn’t materialise during Sunday’s Grand Prix as Mercedes opted to pit Russell twice – firstly for a new set of mediums during the Virtual Safety Car and then again onto the hard tyre – when the majority of other teams went for a one-stop strategy.<\/p>\n