Shovlin praises how Russell approached weekend with Mercedes

George Russell missed out on the podium last weekend, but that was not his fault. The young British driver who came in for Lewis Hamilton could not have done better. He steered the Mercedes over the track in an unprecedented way, even though he wasn't comfortable in the car and didn't know all the systems yet. 

Very impressive performance

With the race behind us Mercedes trackside engineer Andrew Shovlin has been looking back on last weekend. He was very impressed with the Williams driver's performance.

"Probably the thing that was least surprising was his speed in qualifying. Because if you look at what he'd been doing in the Williams, clearly he knows how to drive a car quickly. And he knows how to get the most out of it."

"So that was not a complete shock to me, it was kind of what we were hoping to see, and what we were pleased that we did see. How he handled the pressure, that's the harder thing to really predict, how he's going to get on. But that was very impressive, actually, he really attacked the session," Shovlin said on Autosport.com.

A big risk

If you are given a chance like this, the risk of making mistakes is high and this can work against you. It was precisely that pressure that hung over Russell, but that is what he can deal with, he showed. "The risk - if this is one opportunity to show what you can do in a fast car - is it's so easy to get it wrong. And it's so easy to create lasting impressions."

"But clearly, he wasn't thinking about that for a second. He really attacked the session. He was confident, he was disciplined. He was methodical in how he approached each run. At times, we were under pressure with both drivers in the early part of it. And he stayed calm, and that was nice to see. He's clearly a very good racing driver."

"He's done a good job, he's approached that methodically."