The Mercedes W13 faced far more trouble than expected in qualifying for the 2022 Formula 1 Belgian Grand Prix, with Hamilton finishing seventh 1.8sec off the fastest time, the handiwork of Max Verstappen, and Russell trailing his teammate in eighth place.
Penalties on the Dutch driver and many others meant that the famous silver bullets actually started from positions four and five, but George Russell, having seen the pace of his car on Saturday, anticipated a tricky race.
However, in the closing stages of the race, the young Briton was catching up with third-placed Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari when an error blocking the tires caused him to miss the opportunity to overtake the Spaniard.
“I have mixed emotions because I felt like the podium could be real, and I could have done it,” he said when asked by Motorsport.com.
“But the only thing that is talked about nowadays in Formula 1 is the tyres, and I had a little blockage, I went a little long and that’s where I lost everything, that was the end of the game. Like I said, mixed feelings. “.
“We didn’t expect to finish two seconds behind Sainz . We thought we might be able to overtake Charles Leclerc (starting 15th), but not Verstappen (14th).”
“Max was probably much further ahead than we thought. And in turn we were closer to Ferrari than we thought. So I would say it was positive in some ways and negative in others,” added the Mercedes driver.
Speaking about the difference in pace from Saturday to Sunday – not the first time this has happened to Mercedes so far in 2022 – Russell concluded that Spa-Francorchamps was a clear example of Brackley ‘s cars they are better in race conditions because of the way the tires are managed.
“Yeah, I’d say that assessment is pretty correct. We definitely didn’t do well yesterday in qualifying. And we probably lost about a second of performance just because of the tyres. Today obviously we were much stronger.”
“I think this circuit exposes some of the weak points in our car philosophy. And I hope things will improve from next weekend.”
“But to be honest, it’s all a bit fuzzy at the moment and there’s no guarantee of anything. I’d like to think this is probably going to be our worst weekend of the year,” Russell added.
As for the porpoising that the Mercedes W13 could suffer in the banked corners of Zandvoort this weekend, the British driver was not worried.
“We struggled a bit with porpoising again this weekend. This was a bit bumpier circuit than the four tracks we raced on before the summer break. But I think there are no problems at those specific corners [in Zandvoort]. ], I hope it goes well,” concluded the Mercedes driver.
