George Russell believes that Mercedes has successfully resolved the persistent speed and deployment mysteries that plagued his W17 race car during recent Formula 1 grands prix weekends.
"Effectively it was numbers on a screen that were not quite calibrated properly, and so it’s not like the hardware is wrong or there’s a problem with the hardware," said Russell to media outlets including Autoweek.
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SubscribeThe British driver suffered from a lack of top-end speed at his home race in Silverstone, followed by deployment hiccups caused by software calibration issues during the Belgian Grand Prix weekend.
These technical setbacks proved costly, dropping Russell to third place in the Drivers Championship standings and leaving him 50 points behind the championship leader.
Russell Relieved to Focus on Pure Driving
Uncovering the root cause provided immense relief for the Mercedes contender, who previously spent multiple practice sessions altering his driving style and gear usage to compensate for the unexpected power unit limitations.
Understanding that the performance deficit stemmed from screen numbers rather than hardware failure or his personal driving technique took a massive load off his mind.
"Throughout some laps at Silverstone and the majority of Friday and Saturday at Spa I was thinking about how I needed to drive to make the power unit fast in the straight," Russell explained.
"I’m looking forward to going into a weekend where I can focus on driving fast, focus on the simple things, I know that’s when I perform at my best," he added.