Qualifications to forget
Qualifying Saturday was decidedly complex for the Mercedes on the circuit of Shanghai, with the two drivers of the Brackley team who cannot be satisfied with the result obtained. While Lewis Hamilton did not even overcome the obstacle of Q1, finishing in 18th position, his teammate is ten positions ahead George Russell, eighth both in qualifying and in the Sprint.
The problems in Sprint
Analyzing the entire day, the Briton indicated the major difficulties he encountered, starting with those that hindered him in the Sprint: “We didn't have our best day today – He admitted – with the strong wind, it was very challenging. The conditions have changed since Friday, so we had to adapt. We chose the Soft tire for the Sprint and it was worth it. The performances were good and allowed us to learn something for tomorrow. Ultimately, we were good at winning a point“.
The red flag obstacle
There was also little satisfaction in the fight for pole position, which ended on the edge of the top-10: “Qualifying was also difficult – he continued – my first lap in Q2 looked very strong, but the red flag forced us to stop. We had to use it another set of tires new ones to move on to Q3. Without this, we would have had two new sets for the final part of qualifying and the outcome could have been different, who knows. We are fighting between P3 and P8 and, unfortunately, in the last few races we have found ourselves at the bottom of this battle in qualifying. Small differences can have a big impact. It is difficult to predict what will happen tomorrow. It's all up to play with the cars around us, so hopefully we have the pace to move forward.”
#Russell #red #flag #outcome
