Unlike Hamilton, Russell remains hopeful: 'That can change everything'

George Russell believes there is a chance for Mercedes to improve in Sunday's Brazilian Grand Prix. Both he and Lewis Hamilton dropped back in the sprint race, with Toto Wolff labelling it as a "bruising day". Whereas Lewis Hamilton has ruled himself out of winning the race, Russell pins his hopes on a small change in conditions.

Mercedes set to improve?

On the soft tyre, the likes of Max Verstappen, Lando Norris and Sergio Perez just pulled away from Mercedes. In the end, Mercedes ended up more than 20 seconds behind the leaders. Russell described this as a "tough pill to swallow" in his conversation with Sky Sports.

Russell tried to explain what went wrong: "It's down to these tyres and getting them in the sweet spot. It wasn't there for us today".

Brazilian Grand Prix

All the attention now turns to Sunday's Brazilian Grand Prix. Teams and drivers cannot do much to their car set-up due to the Parc Ferme rules, but Russell is hoping that a forecasted change outside of his control happens.

"We're not too optimistic now, but conditions are different, and can change everything. I'm 100% sure it will look different tomorrow. It's 3 degrees different, which is everything. Fingers crossed it changes it for us but no guarantees," Russell concluded. 

Russell's teammate Hamilton was less optimistic about the Grand Prix. He is confident Sunday will be a long afternoon, and he has ruled himself out of winning the race.