George Russell is adamant he will be ‘going for it’ as he targets what would be a shock Australian Grand Prix win.
Russell took full advantage of Sergio Perez’s technical issues with the brakes on his Red Bull to land a front-row grid slot alongside the Mexican’s team-mate Max Verstappen.
With his own team-mate Lewis Hamilton lining up third, the sight of two Mercedes so close to reigning champion Verstappen came as a surprise to many observers, not least the Dutchman.
Even Russell was seemingly caught unawares by the performance of a car that has been woefully off the pace to date, and is currently undergoing a major overhaul ahead of a planned resurgence from the sixth round in Imola onwards.
“We weren’t expecting that, that’s for sure,” said Russell.
“There’s been a lot of hard work going on back in the factory and here in Melbourne. But wow! What a session for us. The car felt alive, and that lap at the end was right on the limit.
“I’ve got to be honest, I’m a little bit disappointed we didn’t get pole position. It’s one of those things, how your expectations change so quickly in this sport.
“We probably would have been happy with a top four, top five but the car felt awesome, and it goes to show we’ve definitely potential still to come.”
W14 “best car” Russell has raced
Russell trailed Verstappen by just 0.236s by the end of qualifying, believing the difference to be the fact the W14 is “lacking a bit of downforce” compared to the RB19.
Despite the problems the team has had with the car this season, the 24-year-old has still declared it to be “the best F1 car I’ve ever raced”.
Given what Mercedes currently has in development, Russell added: “We know we’ve made some huge gains over the past two or three weeks in the wind tunnel, and hopefully we’ll be bringing that to the track sooner rather than later.
“But this result is going to give us a huge amount of confidence, regardless of what the race brings, over the course of the next four weeks.
“If we can deliver a performance like this with a car that is definitely quite a bit off the pace, it shows good promise for when we bring our first upgrade.”
Despite Red Bull’s pace advantage, Russell sees no reason why he cannot challenge Verstappen for victory in Melbourne.
“We’ve got to go for it, haven’t we? We’ve got to go for a win,” said Russell.
“Max is going to be extremely fast, there’s no hiding that, and it’s difficult to overtake around this circuit, so the start, lap one, is going to be vital.
“But the Red Bull has extraordinary top speed, so it’s going to be very difficult to fight with Max. But let’s see how we get on.
“We’ve got to do our own race. If the opportunity is there, we will go for it.”
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