Mercedes understand Zandvoort set-up error after Monza rebound

Mercedes understand where they went wrong with their car’s set-up last weekend, says George Russell, after the team’s better showing in qualifying yesterday.

Russell qualified third on the grid, behind only the McLaren drivers. Team mate Lewis Hamilton was fourth until the final runs when he made a mistake and fell behind the Ferrari drivers.

Nonetheless Russell was encouraged by the balance the team found with its car after its struggles one week ago. “It feels good around here,” he said. “Last week, I think we recognise where we went wrong with the set-up.

“In this sport it runs away from you really, really quickly if you’re just on the wrong side of that sweet spot and that’s absolutely what we found in Zandvoort. As painful as it is, it’s important sometimes to have those disappointing weekends.

“There’s no guarantees for [the race]. We weren’t a million miles away in qualifying in Zandvoort, but I am confident we’ll be more in the mix and try and keep up with these [McLaren] guys.”

Russell said he was finding time with his car throughout Saturday’s running after sitting out first practice on Friday while Andrea Kimi Antonelli drove his car. Antonelli crashed heavily during the session, and repair work delayed Russell’s start to second practice.

“It was a very up and down weekend,” said Russell. “Obviously I missed a lot yesterday, which put me really on the back foot.

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“I had to make a lot of changes from FP3 into qualifying because that was really my first proper session out on track. And Q1 and Q2 was really, really messy. I wasn’t confident, didn’t feel good in the car and just sort of scraped through the session.

“Then suddenly I managed to get it in the sweet spot for Q3. Both my laps, I think I was third or fourth, and obviously ended up third. So I’m pretty pleased with that result and it’s kind of exciting to see how close it is with everyone.”

However Russell said there are still many unknowns ahead of today’s race. “I don’t really know what to expect because I’ve just not really done the laps, to be honest,” he said. “So I’ll just have to trust my instincts and go from there, really, and adapt on the fly.

“As I said, I’m really, really pleased to be lining up P3 after the day we’ve had, and the car definitely seems to have potential.”