Russell compliments FIA in opposition to Verstappen after intervention

George Russell was one of the drivers who cried loudest for rule changes regarding porpoising. The president of drivers' union GPDA was at his beck and call by the FIA in Canada, as a 'technical directive' was issued. Russell is pleased with the adequate action of the international governing body.

"It’s promising to see that they’ve made action on this straight away and it’s not taken them weeks and months and political decisions to change something like this," Russell says in an interview with Sky Sports. The Mercedes driver is happy that for the sake of safety, action was taken as quickly as possible.

"So I’m pleasantly…not surprised to see it come in so quick, but I think it’s good for everyone," he states. Still, there are divisions within Formula One. Drivers such as Valtteri Bottas, Carlos Sainz, Daniel Ricciardo and Pierre Gasly let it be known after the Azerbaijan Grand Prix that they would gladly welcome an investigation by the International Motorsport Federation. Max Verstappen and Helmut Marko, however, already let it be known that they were not at all satisfied with the FIA's intervention.

Adjustment of the rules

Russell continued his story by saying, “This is something that everyone thinks Mercedes is pushing for, but from a pure performance side of things we don’t really want change because if there’s change you never know if it’s going to go in your favour or against you." The rule, which is likely to be enforced from the British Grand Prix, ironically may have a negative impact on the W13.

If a car bounces too hard over the asphalt or the frequency of bouncing is too high, the FIA will require a team to further increase the ride height. This comes at the expense of speed and so race teams want to avoid it at all costs.