High praise for George Russell: "He's a bit like Nigel Mansell"

Claire Williams has heaped further praise on driver George Russell, comparing his qualifying performances to those of Williams and F1 legend Nigel Mansell. Russell outqualified his teammate Robert Kubica in every race in 2019, the only driver on the grid to do so.

Despite failing to score a point in his debut season, Russell put in plenty of solid performances, especially on Saturdays.

One effort that particularly stands out was at Hungary, where the 2018 F2 champion was just a fraction of a second away from making it through to Q2, an amazing showing given his uncompetitive machinery.

Williams told Motorsport.com: "We see him on a Saturday in qualifying - and people might not focus on what George Russell does because he's in a Williams at the back - but he gets in that car, and the boys gather around the TV screens and they're excited about watching him.

"It's a bit like Nigel [Mansell], he just extracts everything that he possibly can and yes it might be a second off getting into Q2 but he's still banging in some pretty impressive laps.

"Everyone knows and loves George because of the personality that he is. I can't speak highly enough of him and him.

"I am enormously grateful to George because he has very quickly understood the role that he can play in keeping team morale up empty space.

"Yes, he has the occasional moan like we all do, but he has held his head high and he's done everything that we've asked him to do."