Too much fuel cost Russell pole position: The team planned two preparation laps…
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George Russell produced an impressive qualifying performance in Mexico to get the better of his team-mate and future world champion Kimi Antonelli. It is not that George has been unable to beat the young Italian this season, but his performances have lacked consistency. Now he will once again be hoping that a strong qualifying session in Mexico marks the start of something special.
Russell missed out on pole position by just nine thousandths of a second. Yet there was a clear sense of relief on the British driver’s face after qualifying. George has all but lost the title battle and now needs as many small victories as possible to build towards stronger performances in 2027.
Days like these can provide a significant psychological boost. “Last lap wasn’t easy at all, to be honest. It’s a little bit of a story of my season. I think this kind of feels like I’ve never done an average lap. It’s either a terrible lap or a very strong lap, and this is quite frustrating,” Russell reflected after qualifying.
“I don’t think there was a single lap this whole weekend ahead of Q3 that I looked in the mix to even fight for the top three, let alone pole position. But that last lap just came together really nicely. I’d love to know exactly why, but I don’t have those answers. And, yeah, I’ll take it,” Russell added.
On Saturday, he seemed unable to decide whether to do extra preparation lap or not. On his first run, he tried going without extra prep lap but changed his mind at the end of the first sector. On his second run, he committed to push straight away, and it paid off. The team, however, had planned for extra prep lap and put more fuel in the car, which proved costly for George.
“I saw Lewis and Charles and Max weren’t doing the prep lap. We were doing prep laps, just getting the temperature of the tyre. It’s quite challenging. My gut told me we could do it on lap one without the preparation, but the team wanted to do the prep, so we ended up carrying the fuel for an extra lap. You know, it’s such a small number, but it’s bigger than the gap to pole,” noted Russell, who, as mentioned, missed out on pole position by just nine thousandths of a second.
“You always think retrospectively, if only we had the one lap of fuel rather than the extra lap of fuel that we had, we could have been on pole. But, you know, I’m very grateful to be in this position because it’s been a tough run. And, like I said straight out of the car, I know it’s in there. I’ve never doubted that it’s in there. It’s just understanding why this season we can’t achieve it as consistently as I have done in the past,” George said.
Assessing his chances in Sunday’s race, he echoed his fellow drivers’ comments that overtaking would be very difficult. Starting from second, however, George is in an ideal position to attack into the first corner.
“I think it’s just very close between the top four teams at the moment. You know, every Q3 we go into in recent races, it feels like it can go either way between any of the four teams,” said Russell.
“I think the race pace, there’s probably going to be a tenth between the top seven or eight drivers. So, I think Turn 1 is going to be crucial. Overtaking is going to be tough, overheating, etcetera. It’s always the case here in Mexico. But get a good night’s sleep and see what tomorrow brings,” he added.