George Russell is aiming for the podium in Mexico
The young Mercedes driver believes in his chances of reaching the podium at the Frères Rodrigues circuit. He assures that he has a good pace despite only having one practice session.
George Russell had a phenomenal start to the season. However, the second half of the season has been more challenging. The one who accumulated Top 5 finishes in races is receiving less attention.
His last podium was at the Italian Grand Prix. Since then, the British driver has been struggling more to find his way to the front. However, in Mexico, he had very good practice sessions this Friday, despite missing one session because he had to give up his seat to Nyck de Vries in FP1.
While in FP2 all the other drivers were trying out the 2023 tires, he was one of the few with the tires from this year and set the fastest time of the session. For him, the sensations were good with the W13.
Today was one of our best Fridays, if not the best of the year so far: the car is running well and we feel good on this track, he assures.
The pace was relatively high, but we are aware of the challenges on this circuit. For the qualifying, the difficulty will be to get the tires in the right window on a single lap. And on Sunday, it will be difficult to manage the engine and brake temperatures. A podium should be possible this weekend, so that’s what we’re aiming for.
Not having normal FP2, where we can assess the performance of our rivals on long runs, doesn’t allow us to understand where our competitors stand, and this can be a real problem if we struggle with tire temperatures during the race. We have gained very valuable insights on tire temperature management for next year and we will work hard tonight as it won’t be an easy weekend, that’s for sure.
The British driver is currently 4th in the drivers’ standings and has a 16-point lead over Carlos Sainz, but he is 47 points behind Sergio Perez. It will be very difficult for the Mercedes driver to regain 3rd place.
