Russell stars then blunders

A standout star in qualifying, George Russell seemed to find another level in Saturday’s sole session amid the wet conditions.

The F1 sophomore’s patient driving style yielded dividends where others failed to switch on their extreme wet-compound tyres, keeping his head above water in the first part of qualifying to secure Williams’s first Q2 berth since the 2018 Brazilian Grand Prix. Once in Q2, he impressed even more and scooped the 12th-fastest time, which became 11th on the grid following Charles Leclerc’s three-place penalty.

But if the 2018 F2 champion was ‘Russell the Hustle’in qualifying, he was‘zippy George of the Bungle’ on Sunday. In Russell’s defence, the race started well; anchoring himself in 11th, he couldn’t quite hang on to Lance Stroll’s coat-tails after they’d got ahead of the Ferrari chaos. But as he fought the Haas of Kevin Magnussen at the restart, Russell snatched at the brakes on the infield section and went off into the gravel outside Turn 6, which he immediately took responsibility for.

“I locked the rears,”explained Russell, who recovered to beat team-mate Nicholas Latifi to 16th. “That put me off-line and there was zero grip there. A complete driver error, I hold my hands up for that. I apologise to the team – it wasn’t good enough from my side but nevertheless it was a very difficult race from then on.”