The fight between Ferrari and Mercedes for second place in the constructors' championship ended in favor of the Brackley team, with the finale suspended until the final laps. Although it wasn't a particularly positive weekend for the German team, in reality the four-point lead before the weekend, as well as the fact that Carlos Sainz finished outside the top ten, proved enough to finish ahead of their Maranello rivals.
Equally fundamental was the podium achieved by George Russell, who thus concluded his season with a good third place in what was a year full of ups and downs, both for the team and on a personal level.
On the one hand, the W14 proved to be a difficult car to understand and fine-tune in terms of set-up, but on the other hand, the British driver himself was also the protagonist of several errors which had an impact on the ranking, such as in Canada and Singapore, among other things at times when he was still fighting for a place in the top three. Russell has achieved just two podiums this year, in Spain and Abu Dhabi, a full five fewer than his seven in 2022. Additionally, he scored 175 points in 2023, 100 fewer than last year, when he finished fifth in the standings, in a championship enhanced by his first victory in Formula 1.
Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images
George Russell, Mercedes F1 W14
In addition to this, Russell's season was also marred by some reliability problems, as in Australia, on which a strategy error had also had a negative impact, and in Sao Paulo, where he still found himself in difficulty precisely because of this unpredictable character of the W15. Looking back at the world championship, in reality the Brit had started the year with good competitiveness, even managing to briefly take the lead in the GP at the Australian weekend. However, almost coinciding with the arrival of the new package in the Monaco GP, Russell began to lose his way, struggling in both qualifying and the race due to a lack of feeling with the car.
Intense work behind the scenes during the summer break allowed us to regain competitiveness, especially in the first events after the break, at the basis of which there was also a change of mentality in tackling the weekend: fewer experiments and simplification in the search for the setup, although the W14 has proven to be difficult to interpret from this point of view. When asked how he would evaluate the year, Russell underlined precisely this fluctuating trend in which he often failed to materialize opportunities: “It was a very, very strange season. It was a season in which at times we had a lot of pace, but we never achieved the results I thought were deserved or possible.”
“We must therefore try to understand the reason for this situation. There were many missed opportunities from many points of view. It was not an easy season. But I believe that when everything works well, luck tends to be on your side. But when not everything works well, you tend to have bad luck. I'm not one who believes in luck. I think you make your own luck. So, we just have to be faster and luck will be with us.”
![George Russell, Mercedes-AMG](https://cdn-3.motorsport.com/images/mgl/6D1XVB40/s1000/george-russell-mercedes-amg.jpg)
Photo by: Steve Etherington / Motorsport Images
George Russell, Mercedes-AMG
If in 2022 his consistency was surprising, so much so that he was first in the standings behind the Red Bull-Ferrari duo, in 2023 the situation was completely reversed: “It's definitely an aspect that I will examine during the winter. Last year the results were so consistent that we finished in the top five more than any other driver. This year, however, I feel like I improved my pace in qualifying and in the race, but we still found ourselves at a disadvantage.” .
“But this year we definitely had more competition. McLaren joined the fight in the second half of the season, while Aston was there at the start of the season. But ultimately… let's think about next year.”
Looking ahead to 2024, the Briton is well aware of the task ahead for Mercedes. The hope is always to fight for the title, but undoubtedly we will first have to face the competition from Ferrari and McLaren, with the latter wanting to continue to grow after a convincing last part of the world championship. The ultimate objective, however, remains Red Bull and Russell believes that Mercedes is in a better situation than in recent years, given that it is now aware of the direction in which to work, opposite to that followed in 2021 and 2022: “We are all trying to catch up to the most dominant car in F1 history. It's no small task and everyone will have to be united, focused, give their all and time will tell. I believe we are heading into the winter in a better position than 12 months and two years ago, but time will tell.”
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