{"id":892738,"date":"2026-09-12T07:24:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-12T07:24:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/892738\/"},"modified":"2026-09-12T07:24:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-12T07:24:10","slug":"new-george-russell-clue-emerges-over-mercedes-penalty-decision","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/892738\/","title":{"rendered":"New George Russell clue emerges over Mercedes penalty decision"},"content":{"rendered":"

George Russell<\/a> has confirmed that Mercedes<\/a> is delaying his engine penalty until the team introduces an upgrade under the FIA\u2019s ADUO scheme.<\/p>\n

The plan will prevent Russell from having to serve two separate engine-related grid drops over the remainder of the F1 2026 season.<\/p>\n

George Russell penalty to coincide with Mercedes engine upgrade<\/p>\n

Mercedes holds a commanding lead in both world championships with a maximum of 10 races remaining in F1 2026, having won all but four of the 13 rounds held so far this season.<\/p>\n

The Brackley team sits 122 points clear of second-placed Ferrari in the constructors\u2019 championship, with Russell and teammate Kimi Antonelli occupying the top two slots in the drivers\u2019 standings.<\/p>\n

Despite its success, Mercedes\u2019 reliability record has been patchy in 2026 with Russell and Antonelli suffering mechanical retirements in Canada and Barcelona respectively.<\/p>\n

Kimi Antonelli vs George Russell: Mercedes head-to-head stats for F1 2026 season<\/p>\n

F1 2026: Head-to-head qualifying statistics between teammates<\/a><\/p>\n

F1 2026: Head-to-head race statistics between teammates<\/a><\/p>\n

The team has been forced to exceed its component limits for the season, with Antonelli serving an engine penalty at last weekend\u2019s Italian Grand Prix.<\/p>\n

The 20-year-old went on to win from 19th on the grid, extending his advantage over Russell to 66 points.<\/p>\n

Russell himself will be forced to take a penalty of his own over the coming races, with Mercedes yet to decide when the British driver takes a grid drop.<\/p>\n

Speaking to PlanetF1.com and other media outlets ahead of this weekend\u2019s Spanish Grand Prix, Russell confirmed that Mercedes is deliberately waiting to trigger his penalty so it can coincide with the team\u2019s latest engine upgrade under the ADUO (Additional Development and Upgrade Opportunities) scheme.<\/p>\n

This will prevent him from having to serve a further penalty later in the season when Mercedes\u2019 ADUO upgrade arrives.<\/p>\n

He explained: \u201cWe\u2019re waiting to take my penalty with the ADUO upgrade. Otherwise, if I took it there [Monza], I\u2019d have to take it [a penalty] again. So it made zero sense for me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Russell went on to concede that Monza was the \u201cperfect race to take a penalty\u201d after Antonelli\u2019s win.<\/p>\n

He said: \u201cHe obviously had an amazing race and it was a very unique circuit.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think anybody expected the tow and the slipstream to be so powerful. When I got passed by Max, the next lap I gained 1.4 seconds just in the straight on myself.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously Kimi was up to P5-P6 just after a handful of laps and the red flag was maybe slightly beneficial as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we\u2019d have still been in the fight even if he started on pole and I started second.<\/p>\n

\u201cI still think 30 laps into the race, we would have still been nose to tail battling one another.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo it was obviously, with the benefit of hindsight, that was the perfect race to take a penalty.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following an early red flag at Monza, Russell remained on hard tyres for the duration while Antonelli ran two stints on the medium tyre to catch and pass his teammate.<\/p>\n

Asked if he feels he is being treated equally to Antonelli by Mercedes, Russell insisted: \u201cYeah, I do, to be honest.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the race last week when he pitted, I initially thought I was on the right strategy, to be honest, because in the strategy meeting in the morning, we said the fastest race, if you could, was to start on the hard and do no pit stop \u2013 and that was faster than doing a pit stop.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd I think the reality is he\u2019s performing better than me at the moment.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd if I pitted and he stayed out, maybe he still would have won the race. Maybe not. Who knows?<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is something I just need to just continue working on.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the last two races for me have arguably been two of my strongest weekends as a whole over the course of the whole weekend in this whole season, so I\u2019m sort of pleased with that.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut of course, I still need to keep on making some improvements.\u201d<\/p>\n

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher<\/p>\n

Want to be the first to know exclusive information from the F1 paddock? Join our broadcast channel on WhatsApp<\/a> to get the scoop on the latest developments from our team of accredited journalists.<\/p>\n

You can also subscribe to the PlanetF1 YouTube channel<\/a> for exclusive features, hear from our paddock journalists with stories from the heart of Formula 1 and much more!<\/p>\n

Read next: Spanish GP predictions: Madring madness, Leclerc hits back, Monaco vibes<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"George Russell has confirmed that Mercedes is delaying his engine penalty until the team introduces an upgrade under…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":892739,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[49,48,578,576,577,3024,1613,1881,44,22395,136945,82],"class_list":["post-892738","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-george-russell","tag-home-page","tag-mercedes","tag-news","tag-popular","tag-spanish-grand-prix","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/892738","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=892738"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/892738\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/892739"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=892738"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=892738"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=892738"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}