George Russell

Russell: Mercedes motivated to “bounce back” after Hamilton’s title loss

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In the round-up: George Russell says he feels he is “returning home” after joining Mercedes, and the team is eager to come back fighting after their disappointing end to 2021.

In brief

Racing for Mercedes like “returning home” for Russell

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New Mercedes F1 driver Russell says that racing for the team in the 2022 season “feels like returning home”.

Russell was promoted from Williams to the second race seat at the Mercedes factory team after spending many seasons as a Mercedes junior driver, receiving support from the team along his route to Formula 1.

Now he is racing for the team alongside Lewis Hamilton, Russell says he was able to quickly adjust to his new surroundings.

“It’s an incredibly special feeling to be an official Mercedes driver and a bit of a strange feeling at the same time, having spent so much time there when I was in Formula 3 and Formula 2 as a junior driver,” Russell said. “In a way, it feels like returning home to people who I’ve known for such a long time and getting up to speed with how the team operates again, which is something I’ve really enjoyed.

“Because I spent so much time with the team prior to joining Williams in Formula 1 as a junior driver, I feel like I know everybody so well already, so we were just straight to business on the important bits and bobs to understand the new car, to understand the challenges and to try and prepare as best as possible for the season ahead.

“And I think, following the conclusion of last year, there’s so much motivation and fire within the whole factory to bounce back, and that is incredible for me to see.”

Heat could prove “key factor” in Mexico City E-Prix – Guenther

Formula E continues in Mexico this weekend
Maximilian Guenther expects that the heat in Mexico City could play a major factor in today’s Formula E race.

After the opening two races of the season took place in cool conditions under the lights in Saudi Arabia, Guenther says that drivers and teams will have to be mindful of their rear tyre temperatures during the Mexico City E-Prix.

“The amount of management that we do in these kinds of races where it’s hotter and where there’s a lot of tyre energy like on this track – very quick corners, Tarmac quite demanding for the tyres – you have to manage a lot of energy, but as well the tyres quite a lot,” explained Guenther.

“So the rear tyres with the higher power is definitely a key factor for having a good race. Already in season six with less standard power, it was a challenge. So I’m expecting even more here on Saturday.”

Quotes: Hazel Southwell

Cohen joins Jenzer from Carlin for second season in F3

Ido Cohen will contest his second Formula 3 campaign with Jenzer after the team announced the 20-year-old as its first driver for the upcoming season.

Cohen raced for Carlin in last year’s championship, but failed to record a single points finish.

Team Driver Driver Driver
Prema Oliver Bearman Arthur Leclerc Jak Crawford
Trident Jonny Edgar Zane Maloney Roman Stanek
ART Gregoire Saucy Juan Manuel Correa TBA
Hitech Isack Hadjar Kaylen Frederick TBA
Van Amersfoort Reece Ushijima Rafael Villagomez Franco Colapinto
MP Alexander Smolyar TBA TBA
Campos Pepe Marti Hunter Yeany TBA
Carlin Zak O’Sullivan TBA TBA
Jenzer Ido Cohen TBA TBA
Charouz Laszlo Toth Francesco Pizzi TBA

Mercedes ‘Accelerate 25’ diversity programme exceeds target in first year

Mercedes’ programme designed to increase the number of workers from under-represented groups for at the team has exceeded its target over the first year of implementation.

The ‘Accelerate 25’ programme is an initiative started by Mercedes at the end of 2020 with a view to hire more team members who are women or from minority ethnic backgrounds over the five years leading to the end of 2025.

After the first 12 months of implementation, Mercedes announced that the team had exceeded the programme’s target of 25% of new starters with the team coming from under-represented backgrounds. In 2021, 38% of new starters on permanent or fixed-term contracts with Mercedes came from these recognised minority groups.

The impact of the first year of the programme has seen the proportion of Mercedes employees who are women rise from 12% to 14%, while the proportion of team members who are of minority ethnic backgrounds has doubled from 3% to 6%.

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Comment of the day

With Lando Norris having signed a contract extension with McLaren, committing to the team for better or worse until at least the end of the 2025 season, @ferrox-glideh thinks Norris is giving himself the best possible chance of success:

Norris may have just pulled a very clever move by committing to McLaren like he has. This loyalty has been a feature of his career style in F1 to date (sponsors take notice!), and he has basically doubled down on a good bet.

He currently seems to be more interested in excelling in his sport than earning the bigger big bucks. By locking down a long term contract he doesn’t have to face the very real anxiety about job security that most drivers on the grid deal with every season (including much more experienced hands).

All of these drivers are now physically peak athletes, so it is the mental game which will decide future contests. He has taken control of his immediate future, and even if McLaren don’t immediately build a winning car, he is assured a certain stability. Norris’s well-timed move (going with the formula change) will probably be mirrored too late by his peers in the coming years, including Daniel Ricciardo.

Of course, it is still too soon to tell how this will ultimately pan out, but still: interesting times!
@Ferrox-glideh

Happy birthday!

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On this day in motorsport

  • Born today in 1974: Future F1 and IndyCar racer – plus Formula Nippon and Super GT champion – Toranosuke Takagi

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Will Wood
Will has been a RaceFans contributor since 2012 during which time he has covered F1 test sessions, launch events and interviewed drivers. He mainly...

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12 comments on “Russell: Mercedes motivated to “bounce back” after Hamilton’s title loss”

  1. Mayrton
    12th February 2022, 7:57

    Some other team (for a change) getting the wins would be more awesome however. Always nice for the sport in general. So hopefully they’ll do fine but not to the extent they did in the past.

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      David BR (@david-br)
      12th February 2022, 12:32

      Did you know they had a 2021 season? There was even a new non-Mercedes champion! Check it out some time.

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        Esploratore (@esploratore1)
        13th February 2022, 1:56

        Did you know mercedes still won the constructors and had the overall best car (slightly)?

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          drmouse (@drmouse)
          14th February 2022, 11:11

          Did you know that they only won even that by a fairly narrow margin, and that it wouldn’t have taken much for RBR to clinch the WCC too?

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    Jere (@jerejj)
    12th February 2022, 8:59

    I’m unsure if ‘heat’ is necessarily the most fitting word for Mexico City, as that city isn’t hugely warm per se – for instance, mid-20s figures at maximum within this month.

    I share COTD’s view in principle. His situation for the foreseeable future is well-secured.

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    hahostolze (@hahostolze)
    12th February 2022, 9:11

    I’ll be the first to say, with that nose up and those huge wheels, I categorically do not like how these cars look on track. Like a throwback to the late 70s or even the Lotus 49 of the late 60s. Or more like an Indycar with suspension damage.

    1. Jeffrey Powell
      12th February 2022, 11:48

      You didn’t like the Lotus 49,well there is certainly no accounting for individual taste.I remember vividly when it first appeared , I thought it looked great, maybe it was the thought of how Jimmy would destroy the opposition colouring my judgement.

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        hahostolze (@hahostolze)
        12th February 2022, 13:10

        I love the Lotus 49! Sorry, maybe that’s not clear. But I don’t love the comparison.

    2. XV
      12th February 2022, 20:17

      Didn’t notice the higher nose from the reveals too much, where the camera angles tend to look downward onto the cars. But when these cars are shown in profile, the nose height does look too high, especially as the body/floor clearance has become lower.

    3. Coventry Climax
      13th February 2022, 1:02

      The high nose is because of road relevance and everybody liking/wanting ridiculous SUV’s these days. For the same reason the weight has gone up to obese SUV proportions, and they’ll probably introduce sleeping policemen anytime soon.

      More serious; I can’t say I like the new looks either. With the cars we’ve seen so far, everybody seems to be gushing over the ‘huge differences’. To me, that’s Trump-speak, as I think what we’ve seen so far looks like the same FIA proto has been going around the teams, with each a couple of days to dress it up in their livery and add some fake, minor cosmetic changes. I also don’t like the rear wing design. Looks like a stupid gimmick now. If that shape really were an advantage, we’d have seen it a long, long time ago already.

      I know, we may -and probably will- see some more changes once the first weekend starts, but they’ll still look like spec cars more than ever before.

      But they will be able to race more closely, and that’s the most important, you (general) say. Well, first of all, that still remains to be seen, and secondly, I’m not so sure it really is the most important – to me.

      1. Coventry Climax
        13th February 2022, 1:04

        Oh, and I think the Lotus 49 was/is an iconic beauty, by the way.

  4. Coventry Climax
    13th February 2022, 1:09

    Apparently, mr. Guenther thinks the more there is to manage, the better the racing gets.
    Sorry, can’t agree with that.

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