Warrior Russell is a top three driver on the grid, says Mercedes' Wolff
After a relentless performance in the China Grand Prix on Sunday, Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff has labelled his star driver George Russell as a warrior and claimed he is definitely amongst the top three drivers on the grid and is working his way towards becoming number one.
The Englishman is now Mercedes' main driver alongside the young gun Kimi Antonelli after the departure of Lewis Hamilton and currently sits in third place in the Drivers Championship, nine points behind leader Lando Norris. 'I never give 10 out of 10 because I think there is always something better. We haven't seen the perfect race, but considering the circumstances that George had in China, it is a 10 out of 10.
'He extracted the maximum of this car, the tyres, the strategy, and it was a brilliant drive. All these discussions about Lewis, who is the biggest person in the sport, leaving for Ferrari, is a great story, Kimi coming in as the youngest driver and the high potential, and little was said about George,' Wolf said in an interaction on Tuesday.
Mercedes' Andrea Kimi Antonelli is interviewed. Reuters
'I always said that's not right because he's one of the top drivers out there. If you want me to name three that I consider to be the top [drivers], he's absolutely among those three, if not top two, and maybe on his way to top one,' said Wolff to Sky Sports.
Wolf added, 'George is a warrior, in the car and outside of the car.' However, the 27-year-old is the only major driver on the circuit who currently does not have a contract for 2026, and Wolff refused to give any insight into George's future. 'George is a Mercedes driver, so we love having him on the team. He was a junior driver and a Mercedes-grown talent. I have something to be proud of, and this is where all my concentration goes,' said Wolff after the race on Sunday.
Meanwhile, Hamilton went from the thrill of winning a sprint race for his new Ferrari team to the agony of being disqualified from the Chinese Grand Prix the following day alongside teammate Charles Leclerc.
There was so much drama at Ferrari that it overshadowed Sunday's Grand Prix win for Oscar Piastri, who looks like he might be the closest title challenger to his McLaren teammate Lando Norris this year.
Ahead of next week's Japanese Grand Prix, here are five takeaways from Shanghai:
Having both drivers disqualified for technical infringements is acutely embarrassing for Ferrari, which has two weeks to get to the bottom of the problem before the next race. Leclerc lost his fifth-place finish because his car was underweight, while Hamilton had a ride-height infringement.
All Formula 1 teams set up their cars as close to the limits as possible, but having two cars excluded for different reasons could point to more than one problem with Ferrari's cars or working procedures. 'There was no intention to gain any advantage. We will learn from what happened today and make sure we don't make the same mistakes again,' the team said.
There are also questions over how setup choices affect the two drivers' pace. Hamilton went from having a setup capable of winning the sprint race Saturday to being slower than Leclerc on Sunday, even though his teammate had a broken front wing.
Agence France-Presse
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