The next Hamilton? Autocar meets F1 prodigy George Russell

“F1 is like no other. It’s ruthless, and you have to excel in all areas or you’re going to be chewed up and spat out. I recognised that early, and I’ve been working ever since to become better and better.”

In his first 35 races in F1, Russell did that in an uncompetitive Williams. But there was no sense of entitlement holding him back; he didn’t use the poor machinery as an excuse to coast. More drivers than you might think would – but they’re the ones who rarely make it to the top and, if they do, never stay there.

Russell treats every race as an opportunity to impress, and that ensured Mercedes turned to him when Hamilton tested positive for Covid-19. As Russell himself put it, had he been off-form, he might not have been given the chance. But in the Bahrain Grand Prix that preceded his big break, he had qualified and finished 14th in a car that couldn’t have done any better.

That Russell has excelled at Williams might surprise those who remember him for crashing behind the safety car at Imola. That was an unforgivable error, but nobody had to call him out for the amateur mistake because he had already done so himself. The mistake was atypical, a moment of over-aggression while he was trying to maintain tyre temperature at cruising speed on a cold November day, but his reaction wasn’t. That was mental strength.

“If you’re the one to make the mistake, it’s always important to hold your hands up because it makes others realise that if they make a mistake, they can hold their hand up and learn from it,” says Russell.

“That was important, not just for myself but also for the team, to say: ‘I messed this up, I’m incredibly sorry and I’m doing my utmost to not let it happen again. I’ll come back stronger and deliver the goods.’”

Easy to say, harder to do. Success in elite sport requires you to be tough on yourself and analytical to a fault. You need a robust character to be a serial winner. And being a successful racing driver is about far more than being fast because, at F1 level, they’re almost all seriously quick. It’s about channelling that speed via a bewilderingly complex machine that exists at the centre of an organisation of more than 1000 people.

Russell absorbs information like a sponge. The crew on his car for the Sakhir GP weekend had to adapt to him being a lot more talkative than Hamilton. During practice, even on fast laps, he requested information over the radio. At a time when most would be fully absorbed in controlling the car, especially in which they didn’t fit properly and had to wear boots a size too small, Russell was working out how to make it go even faster.

F1 cars aren’t straightforward. Drivers talk about the ‘tools’ that are available to them, which sounds simple enough. But the array of differential settings, brake shapes, engine braking settings and more that can be adapted corner by corner to find those precious extra hundredths or thousandths of a second is seemingly endless. Russell put himself through a crash course to learn everything even at a time when he was unfamiliar with some basic systems; at one point in qualifying, he accidentally put the car into neutral.

But Russell isn’t one to take the easy path. He’s built up his confidence over the years and seems to revel in facing enormous challenges. The sense of self-belief, essential for success at the top level but rarely matched with the qualities needed to deliver, is a key part of any great driver’s make-up. Pressure has cured him into a stronger driver, not broken him.

When asked if he has ever felt pressure to justify the support of Mercedes, Russell replies: “Arguably, when I was a bit younger, maybe my early races in GP3.

“Probably during 2017, there was a point where my mentality shifted. I told myself: ‘I’m here for a reason and they haven’t picked me up for the sake of it.’ Mercedes don’t sign 15-20 young drivers every year; at the time, I was one of three. I knew I had to go out there and do my job to the best of my ability.