George Russell will remain with \u00adMercedes for next season after the Formula One team confirmed they would be sticking with their drivers in 2026. But the length of the contracts signed by the Briton and his teammate, Kimi Antonelli, have not been specified, potentially leaving the F1 team open to once more pursue Red\u00a0Bull\u2019s Max \u00adVerstappen for 2027.<\/p>\n
The long-expected decision comes after a protracted period of negotiation with Russell, as Mercedes seek stability going into the new regulations of 2026. The 27-year-old British driver has five wins in eight seasons in F1, including victory in Singapore, helping propel Mercedes into a fight for second in the world championship with Ferrari and Red Bull.<\/p>\n
Russell, who came up through the Mercedes junior programme, is fourth in the world championship. \u201cI\u00a0am really proud to be \u00adcontinuing our journey together,\u201d he said. \u201cNext year will mark my 10th since I signed with Mercedes back in 2017. It has been such a long and successful partnership so far and I can\u2019t wait to see what lies ahead, particularly as we embark on one of the largest regulation changes in the sport\u2019s history next year.\u201d<\/p>\n
It is understood his desire to reduce his marketing and PR commit\u00adments was part of the deal but the length of the contract is likely to have played a significant part. This year the \u00adMercedes team principal, Toto\u00a0Wolff, made no secret of his desire<\/a> to lure the four-time world champion \u00adVerstappen away from Red Bull.<\/p>\n However, before the Hungarian Grand Prix, Verstappen confirmed he would remain with Red Bull for 2026<\/a>, so Mercedes were expected to stick with their drivers for the new season.<\/p>\n The team\u2019s announcement, made before the US Grand Prix this weekend, makes no mention of the duration of the new deals. A two-year arrangement is standard but both drivers could be on a 1+1 deal which enables either party to exercise an opt\u2011out after the first year.<\/p>\n Kimi Antonelli has also signed a new deal with Mercedes. Photograph: Jayce Illman\/Getty Images<\/p>\n With a complete reset of the regulations next season the form book could change radically and \u00adMercedes will be looking to be flexible come mid-season when it becomes clear who has come out on top, leaving the door open for another pursuit of Verstappen. A switch would look more attractive to the Dutch world champion should, as many expect, Mercedes emerge with a strong car.<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n The best of our sports journalism from the past seven days and a heads-up on the weekend\u2019s action<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com<\/a> to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n Antonelli, who was brought in from the team\u2019s junior programme to replace Lewis \u00adHamilton this season, has had a roller\u00adcoaster first year in F1 but became the third youngest driver to take a podium with third place in Canada. In seventh in the drivers\u2019 championship, the 19-year-old Italian is the highest-placed of this season\u2019s rookie intake.<\/p>\n Wolff said: \u201cConfirming our driver lineup was always just a matter of when, not if. We wanted to take our time, handle the negotiations pro\u00adperly and make sure everyone, on all sides, was happy. George and Kimi have proved a strong pairing and we\u2019re excited to continue our journey together.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"George Russell will remain with \u00adMercedes for next season after the Formula One team confirmed they would be…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":215986,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[49,48,578,576,577,82],"class_list":["post-215985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215985","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=215985"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215985\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/215986"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=215985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=215985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=215985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}