A filmmaker with a soft spot for Ronnie Peterson, Gilles Villeneuve, Mika Hakkinen and above all, Tazio Nuvolari and Ayrton Senna, is also a diehard Formula One fan since the age of 4 (mid-90's). An avid researcher of the past of Grand Prix Racing since before it was even named F1, and with a thirst for knowledge of the ins and outs of the actuality of the sport, as well as for the technical aspects that define it, is a member of GPblog since 2023, where he has put his love of racing to good use.
The F1 Monaco Grand Prix is said to have been a 'boring' race, marred with team games that were viewed as controversial. A driver affected by said team tactics, George Russell proposes to keep the race weekend on the calendar but discard the race on Sunday.
For George Russell the weekend went from bad to worse with the Mercedes driver never really being on the pace. When the time for qualifying came, and he felt confident to be in the top 4, his car stopped on track which meant a P14 start for him for the race on Sunday.
During the Monaco Grand Prix, Williams' Alexander Albon was creating a pitstop window for his teammate Carlos Sainz, at the expense of Russell himself, since the Thai driver was on a 4-seconds slower than normal race pace, according to the Mercedes driver.
Russell then skipped the Nouvelle Chicane, and in doing so overtook Albon. explaining his decision to the Mercedes pitwall, he said: "Had to avoid a collision from Albon. He slammed on the brakes."
When told to give the position back to the Williams driver, he replied: "I'll take the penalty. He's driving erratically. He's on fresh tyres, already two seconds behind. It's clear what they're trying to do and it's **** dangerous."
ADVERTISEMENT
Afterwards, he was informed of the drive-through penalty he'd gotten, he restrained himself, perhaps in light of the drastic penalties drivers will receive if they lash out at race officials, or perhaps due to his role as GPDA co-chair.
"To be honest, I prefer not to speak. Tell Kimi to put the hard brakes on them."
Read also
'Discard Sunday's Grand Prix and make it two qualifying sessions instead'
ADVERTISEMENT
When told Albon would've done the same thing as he did, Russell was adamant: "We definitely need to have a real think about what the solution is here in Monaco. I appreciate trying something this year with the two-stop, clearly it did not work at all," was Russell's opinion on the two-stopper idea when speaking to media like GPblog.
"For all of the drivers, qualifying is the most exhilarating moment of the weekend. Do we accept that there should be no race and it's a qualifying race?," Russell said.
"You do one on Saturday, one on Sunday and the guy who qualifies pole gets some points and gets a little trophy and the one on Sunday gets some more points because that's what we love most."
"I think that's what you guys enjoy watching the most. And 99% of the other people in Monaco are here sipping champagne on a yacht. So, you know, they don't really care."
Don’t miss GPblog in Google
Mark us as a preferred source and our articles will appear more often at the top of Top Stories.
Add as a preferred / source on Google
