Wolff: “Everything went against Russell at Suzuka”

Russell, what a mockery in Japan Considering the great superiority of Mercedes, which emerged from the first tests, and the experience accumulated in seven seasons of Formula 1, at the beginning of the year it was easily conceivable that George Russell would have done en plein in the first GPs. Instead the Briton “only” won the inaugural round in Melbourne, leaving the other two successes to Kimi Antonelli. And now he finds himself chasing the Bolognese in the standings. Although Antonelli was very fast on the race pace in China and Japan, some episodes put the Italian on a downhill road. For example, Russell’s technical problems in qualifying in Shanghai, or the extremely unfortunate timing of the Safety Car at Suzuka, which was sent onto the track a few seconds after the Briton entered the pits and which allowed Antonelli to make a free pit stop. Wolff’s words The outcome of these first races has led some observers to think that Toto Wolff has bet on Antonelli, but the Mercedes team principal continues to blindly believe in Russell. And, after the Japanese GP, he defended him: “I believe that the whole weekend went against him, starting from the decisions on the set-up on Saturday, which made the car worse from FP3 to qualifying.” “As for the pit stop, we had to stop it because otherwise we risked the position in favor of Leclerc (who in turn had stopped to cover Lando Norris’s stop, ed.). Then luck was on Kimi’s side, who was very fast at that moment, and not on George’s side, who then had a software problem and was overtaken by Leclerc.” Wolff, however, doesn’t just talk about bad luck, but also about the improvements that both the drivers and the team must show in Miami: “Certainly the start of George and Kimi saw some errors on the part of the drivers, but we also didn’t provide them with the best tools for the start.”