{"id":680915,"date":"2026-05-20T01:59:16","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T01:59:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/680915\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T01:59:16","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T01:59:16","slug":"the-race-george-russell-must-win-plus-why-were-all-max-verstappen-obsessed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/680915\/","title":{"rendered":"The race George Russell must win. Plus: Why we\u2019re all Max Verstappen-obsessed"},"content":{"rendered":"

Prime Tire Newsletter | This is The Athletic\u2019s F1 newsletter. Sign up here<\/a> to receive Prime Tire directly in your inbox twice a week during the season and weekly in the offseason.<\/p>\n

Welcome back to Prime Tire, where today I\u2019m looking forward to this weekend\u2019s Canadian Grand Prix \u2014 always a highlight of the Formula 1 calendar.<\/p>\n

The three-week gap from Miami to now has a spring break-like feeling. It\u2019s weird to think that had the main race day in Florida been washed out by\u00a0severe thunderstorms<\/a>, then there would have been just one sprint race in an eight-week run.<\/p>\n

Thankfully\u00a0that didn\u2019t happen<\/a>, and now there\u2019s more F1 action coming up, as well as plenty to digest from the paddock in recent days.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m Alex, and Madeline Coleman will be along later.<\/p>\n

Canadian GP: This race matters for the Mercedes duo<\/p>\n

After writing that headline above, I can just hear Mercedes boss Toto Wolf: \u201cWe just really need to stay calm here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Or: \u201cAll of us collectively that are close to him, we need to keep re-emphasizing and repeating the message. This is a long game, he has a killer of a teammate, who is extremely fast. The others are catching up in performance. And we want to play the long game.\u201d<\/p>\n

Much of that familiar feeling is because it\u2019s what I heard Wolff say in his post-race media briefing in the aftermath of Kimi Antonelli\u2019s Miami victory \u2014 although he initially was asked about what the 19-year-old Italian worked on over the winter to be so good right now.<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s also because Mercedes will no doubt again try to dim down narratives that others (including the media) want to highlight in this title battle.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s deal with the PR first.<\/p>\n

Yes, Montreal is just race five of 22 (or\u00a0potentially 23<\/a>, or\u00a0maybe even 24<\/a>).\u00a0There\u2019s a very long way to go in this championship.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Although Antonelli seemed solid since his shaky start in Australia, he could crumble in exactly the same way Oscar Piastri did at McLaren last year, when Lando Norris continually kept himself within reach of his teammate.<\/p>\n

Right now, how\u00a0similar the 2025 and 2026 seasons started<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 in terms of an intra-team title battle and how interlopers thrust themselves into each contest \u2014 stands out.<\/p>\n

In 2025, Norris won the season opener in Australia in impressive fashion. He then seemed to drop off, around some\u00a0mechanical misfortune<\/a>\u00a0in China.\u00a0Ditto to George Russell in 2026.
\nLast year, the McLaren duo had Max Verstappen bothering them with a Red Bull that, at that stage, had no right to, given its severe handling issues.<\/p>\n

Now, as Russell is finding out, the regular\u00a0race-start threat<\/a>\u00a0from Ferrari and the resurgence of both\u00a0McLaren<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Verstappen in Miami<\/a>\u00a0mean any additional slips will make the\u00a0championship-fighting odds that much smaller (as\u00a0Antonelli discovered<\/a> in Australia, too).<\/p>\n

Heading into this weekend\u2019s event, you\u2019ll hear this a lot, and Mercedes and Russell will no doubt try to play it down.\u00a0But the Montreal race really matters for both drivers with the Silver Arrows squad in 2026.<\/p>\n

Russell won this race commandingly last year. And he showed great potential in Montreal in 2023 (before he crashed) and 2024 (when he took pole and led the race early on before a series of errors).<\/p>\n

He just does well at a track that, in the past, was all about choosing the right wing levels to avoid carrying too much drag on the long straights, but still gives a driver enough confidence through elevated downforce levels to attack the corner curbs and save as much time as possible.<\/p>\n

How that translates to how the new cars and their ridiculously complex engines need to be driven to be their fastest will become clear soon enough \u2026<\/p>\n

The\u00a0lesson of the McLaren title fight<\/a>\u00a0in 2025 is that these battles do happen, and they can swing championships\u00a0pretty wildly<\/a>.<\/p>\n

For Antonelli, victory in Canada would sustain his momentum, and soften the blow of any potential dramas or crashes later in the season.<\/p>\n

If Russell can\u2019t defeat Antonelli at a track where he\u2019s done very well in the past, compared to Miami where he has had a harder time historically (although it should be noted Russell finished third in the Miami GP last year), then the narrative will stay that he\u2019s\u00a0really\u00a0in trouble in 2026 \u2026\u00a0no matter how hard Wolff and co. try to say otherwise.<\/p>\n

Inside the Paddock with Madeline Coleman: Hamilton\u2019s new prep plan<\/p>\n

After the Miami GP, Lewis Hamilton was clear: He\u2019s not using Ferrari\u2019s simulator to prepare ahead of the Canadian GP.<\/p>\n

The seven-time world champion\u2019s Miami weekend was trickier than he anticipated, despite Ferrari having the\u00a0most upgrades of all the teams<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He secured seventh in the sprint race and qualified sixth for the grand prix. But contact with Franco Colapinto\u2019s Alpine on the opening lap resulted in damage that cost Hamilton\u2019s car performance.<\/p>\n

But the seven-time world champion already felt the car setup Ferrari had coming into the weekend \u2014 based on data from its simulator \u2014 didn\u2019t work as anticipated,\u00a0and this quickly put him on the back foot.<\/p>\n

Sims have become an important part of race weekend prep and car development for F1 teams, but they\u2019re not perfect tools. Some in-person racing elements, such as G-forces, can\u2019t be replicated.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t like simulators in general, but I sit at the simulator every week in the build-up, working on correlation constantly,\u201d Hamilton said.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou go on it, you prepare for the track, you drive it and you get the car setup to a certain place, and then you come to the track and that setup doesn\u2019t work.\u201d<\/p>\n

Time will tell if opting against using the simulator ahead of Canada works or not for Hamilton.<\/p>\n

Mercedes is expected to bring a bigger upgrade package to Montreal, and it could widen the performance gap across the top four teams. That\u2019s despite Ferrari,\u00a0McLaren<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Red Bull<\/a>\u00a0all seemingly taking steps forward in Miami.<\/p>\n

Back to you, Alex.<\/p>\n

Denied: No N\u00fcrburgring 24 debut win for Verstappen<\/p>\n

It struck me lately that Patrick Iversen and I talk about Verstappen\u00a0a lot\u00a0in PT.<\/p>\n

So far in 2026, there have been six sends dedicated to the Dutchman\u2019s various\u00a0exploits<\/a>,\u00a0words<\/a>\u00a0or developments at\u00a0his Red Bull team<\/a>. And five of those have come since the Japanese GP at the end of March.<\/p>\n

I can explain why.<\/p>\n

Verstappen is\u00a0the\u00a0driver of the current era.\u00a0Even if he\u2019s at the mercy of his car\u2019s ultimate potential (as is the case for every F1 driver).<\/p>\n

To many, he\u2019s the best driver. To others, he\u2019s not \u2014 but he has to be a part of any debate about who really is best, given his undeniable form since his\u00a0breakthrough F1 win in 2016<\/a>.<\/p>\n

And from his position as a four-time world champion, his actions dominate media discussion.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In fact if you take away the focus on the new engines in 2026 \u2014 about which\u00a0Verstappen\u2019s feelings<\/a>\u00a0have influenced\u00a0current debate<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 there would be rather a lack of narratives for F1 devotees to obsess over.<\/p>\n

And Verstappen\u2019s activities away from the track have risen in prominence, both because of the big gap in the calendar mentioned above, and because motor racing fans do like it when drivers compete across categories.<\/p>\n

So, with that particularly in mind, here\u2019s how Verstappen did in his first attempt to win the N\u00fcrburgring 24 Hours sports car race at the\u00a0fearsome 12.9 mile track<\/a>\u00a0in Germany\u2019s Eifel region:<\/p>\n

His Mercedes-AMG GT3 car qualified fourth of 159 starters by his teammate Daniel Juncadella.
\nVerstappen told Juncadella to take the race start, as Verstappen realized\u00a0he wouldn\u2019t be able to\u00a0resist getting stuck in battles<\/a>\u00a0on the opening lap and taking undue risks in such a long contest. Wise.
\nWhen Verstappen did get in the Mercedes for the first time, he took it from 10th to the lead.
\nHe had a near-miss with the barriers early on and only just\u00a0<\/a>avoided a crash between cars ahead during what would be his final stint.
\nOnce two Mercedes cars were in command at the head of the pack, around another blistering Verstappen stint in the race\u2019s night phase, they were told to hold position.
\nThe lead therefore stabilized with Verstappen, Juncadella, Jules Gounon and Lucas Auer leading for several hours.
\nThen, just after Juncadella had taken over from Verstappen with three hours left, the car\u2019s driveshaft broke. Game over.
\nRepairs were completed and Juncadella took the finish, but down in 37th place.
\n\u201cVery unfortunate and frustrating ending, but these things can happen,\u201d Verstappen said afterward\u00a0on Instagram<\/a>, where he also paid tribute to his teammates.
\nOutside the Points<\/p>\n

\ud83e\udd13 In more simulator news, it\u2019s been revealed that Alpine installed\u00a0a new simulator<\/a>\u00a0at its Enstone factory ahead of the 2026 season starting. As Madeline said, this technology is a pivotal part of F1 car development in the modern era, especially given how heavily the teams are restricted on what they can test away from races.<\/p>\n

\u2708\ufe0f Luke Smith analyzed McLaren boss Zak Brown\u2019s push for the FIA to\u00a0clamp down on multi-team ownership<\/a>\u00a0in F1 (think Red Bull and Racing Bulls, and potentially Mercedes and a\u00a0chunk of Alpine<\/a>).<\/p>\n

\ud83c\udfce Hamilton has become\u00a0a patron<\/a>\u00a0of the revamped museum at the Le Mans track that hosts the legendary 24-hour sports car endurance race. He\u2019s never entered it, but the museum is now housing lots of cars from across motorsports, including the 2018 Mercedes that the Briton took to his fifth of seven F1 world titles.<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udceb Love Prime Tire? Check out The Athletic\u2019s other newsletters<\/a>.<\/p>\n