Toto Wolff did not mince his words in the aftermath of the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, after George Russell started third and finished fifth, while Kimi Antonelli started fifth and came home sixth.
Both were passed by McLaren’s Lando Norris, who was recovering back up the field after a poor qualifying and was always going to be difficult to keep at bay. But Russell also lost out to Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari, who disappeared up the road to leave the Mercedes toiling far back from the leaders.
Russell was struggling with his hard compound tyres, even radioing at one point to ask if they would make it to the end of the race, as a line of blisters could be clearly seen on his front left. But he did see the chequered flag after one-stopping – just quite some time after Oscar Piastri had won the race.
“Clearly our worst performance so far from the year. The pace just dropped away with a blistering tyre and overheating tyres, and so far we haven’t got the explanations,” Wolff said afterwards.
Russell suffered with overheating tyres throughout the race in Jeddah
“Today we saw [a gap] against Ferrari and Max [Verstappen] also. So that’s why that was an additional negative that when you kind of manage your expectations by being second quickest – and even that is not obviously what we would wish to achieve – and then you see this race coming, panning out like it did, it just adds to the frustration of the situation.”
Russell called the performance “underwhelming”, which seemed to be a sentiment Wolff agreed with.
But while the pace on the whole was a mystery, Wolff at least ended the first batch of flyaway races full of praise for his rookie driver – Antonelli scoring in four out of the first five Grands Prix and the Sprint as well.
Wolff was full of praise for Antonelli after the opening five races of the season
“I’m really happy the trajectory is right,” Wolff said. “There haven’t been any kamikaze movement[s]. He’s been consistently learning over the weekends.
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“He’s been, interestingly, always very fast when it comes to the end of the weekend, and it seems he gets on top of the car, on top of how to drive the tyres. And it is 100% on target.
“Miami, he doesn’t know Miami, but then from there on, I think we’re going to have a pretty clear picture how this more, let’s say, natural habitat of his, the racetracks he knows [in Europe], is going to impact the performance. But I’m happy.”
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