{"id":25660,"date":"2025-07-26T19:05:03","date_gmt":"2025-07-26T19:05:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/25660\/"},"modified":"2025-07-26T19:05:03","modified_gmt":"2025-07-26T19:05:03","slug":"george-russell-expresses-concern-as-mercedes-take-a-big-step-backwards-in-belgium","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/25660\/","title":{"rendered":"George Russell expresses concern as Mercedes take ‘a big step backwards’ in Belgium"},"content":{"rendered":"

George Russell admitted his concern that Mercedes had \u201ctaken a big step backwards\u201d after another difficult qualifying session for the team at the Belgian Grand Prix.<\/p>\n

Mercedes<\/a> has struggled for pace across the Spa-Francorchamps weekend so far, with neither Russell<\/a> nor Kimi Antonelli<\/a> reaching the final phase of Sprint Qualifying on Friday<\/a>, and both struggling to progress through the field in the Sprint itself.<\/a><\/p>\n

While Russell\u2019s sixth place for Sunday\u2019s Grand Prix may appear a strong result on paper, the Canadian Grand Prix race winner pointed to the fine margins that defined his session.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was for sure, the maximum,\u201d he said. \u201cAll of my laps were strong, but it\u2019s clear that, as a team, we\u2019ve taken a big step backwards this weekend. We don\u2019t really know why.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne tenth slower in Q1, I\u2019d have been almost out. A tenth slower in Q3 and I\u2019d have been P10. P6, I feel, is without doubt, the maximum we could have achieved.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last year, in a race Russell also started from sixth, the Briton took the chequered flag after putting on a spectacular display to make a one-stop strategy work.<\/p>\n

Although his celebrations were halted as he was disqualified for his car being underweight<\/a>, when asked if this gives him hope for this year\u2019s running, he added: \u201cYeah.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think it\u2019ll pan out just like last year, especially as it\u2019s wet tomorrow. But anything can happen. We\u2019ll take those positives, but as a team, we just need to assess why we had four podiums in the first six races and we\u2019ve had one in the last six races.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rookie Antonelli has also found himself enduring a recent run of a bad form, with a third place in Canada his only points score in the last six races. Indeed, he is yet to score a point on European soil.<\/p>\n

An error in Sprint Qualifying left him at the back of Saturday\u2019s grid, but the Italian had no such excuse on Qualifying for the Grand Prix, as he set the third slowest time, with only the two Aston Martins behind him.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just a difficult period,\u201d he conceded. \u201cI just need to get out of this and try to improve for the next one.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe confidence has been missing. Definitely, I struggled to have the same feeling as yesterday, for example, and I just really need to find the light at the end of the tunnel again.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"George Russell admitted his concern that Mercedes had \u201ctaken a big step backwards\u201d after another difficult qualifying session…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25661,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[1687,372,6537,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-25660","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-f1","8":"tag-f1","9":"tag-formula-1","10":"tag-formula1","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25660"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25660\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25661"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}