Toto Wolff has highlighted how George Russell was “stronger” than Lewis Hamilton last season, arguing he now “couldn’t wish for a better” driver to lead his team.
The Mercedes team principal has been effusive in his praise of the 27-year-old, who has been one of the stand-out performers in F1 this season, all year.
Having secured four podiums in the opening six rounds of the campaign, even when a rear suspension upgrade hindered the development of the W16, Russell continued to turn in decent results and retain his comfortable advantage over rookie team-mate Kimi Antonelli.
Despite the doomed update, an outlier win came at the Canadian Grand Prix, and the British driver secured a further podium at the Hungaroring, Mercedes’ first race after reverting to its previous specification.
“When I look at George, the development he’s made since he joined Formula 1 from the fast kiddo in Williams, and then being drafted into Mercedes, clearly with the greatest of all greats, with Lewis Hamilton,” Wolff said of Russell in Mercedes’ mid-season review.
“And you’ve seen already last year he started to be so strong on pure pace – in terms of the results, the stronger driver.”
Breaking down the results
In 2024, Russell outperformed Hamilton, the holder of the record number of pole positions in F1 history with 104, in qualifying.
He beat the seven-time drivers’ champion 19-5 in grand prix grid setting sessions and 5-1 in the sprint equivalents.
The points gap was smaller, with 245 to Hamilton’s 223, but Russell did beat his compatriot in 2022 as well – even if a last-lap overtake by the former on the latter at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, their final race as team-mates, did mean the 40-year-old out-scored the four-time grand prix winner across their three years together at Mercedes.
“And now with Lewis having gone to Ferrari, he’s [Russell] taken the senior driver slot, and it completely came naturally, and he delivers,” continued Wolff.
© XPBimages
‘Couldn’t wish’ for better
Despite stepping into a leading role at the team and performing exceptionally over the first part of the campaign, there has been considerable noise surrounding Russell’s future with the team.
The instability of Max Verstappen’s situation at Red Bull presented Wolff with the opportunity to court the Dutchman, something he has openly expressed an interest in since early last year.
With Antonelli – who is in many ways a second coming of the four-time F1 drivers’ champion to Wolff, after the Austrian missed out on Verstappen a decade ago – considered somewhat of a protected commodity within the team, Russell was left in a vulnerable and precarious position.
However, with Verstappen’s much-discussed contract break clause now null and void and the 27-year-old committed to Red Bull for at least 2026, both current Mercedes drivers look set to extend their existing deals, which are due to expire at the end of the year.
Regardless of the speculation that engulfed Russell and the Brackley-based squad over the past month or so, Wolff insists he could “wish for a better number-one driver” to lead his team.
“He delivers, even when the car is not on the level, he outperforms the car, you can always count on George,” the 53-year-old said.
“And beyond the driving, obviously, he’s also great with our partners and does a lot of activities that help us to build his brand and build our brand.
“So we couldn’t wish for a better number-one driver.”