George Russell admits that he lost several positions on the opening lap due to a "misjudgement" while following Oscar Piastri.

Starting from 8th on the grid the Mercedes driver had made a good getaway and having avoided the shenanigans ahead of him at La Source rounded the corner and headed down the hill towards Eau Rouge.

However, he found himself behind Piastri who had damaged his steering in a clash with the barrier and Carlos Sainz and was already dropping down the field.

"It was just very unfortunate in the beginning, when Oscar had his failure," said the Briton, "I went to the left, sort of misjudged that he can turn, I got boxed in and lost four or five positions."

Indeed, by the end of the opening lap he had dropped to 11th.

"That kind of dictated my race," he added. "If it wasn’t for that I would have been P5. I would have liked to think I would have been there with Lewis and Charles fighting for the podium."

The Briton was one of just three drivers to opt for a one-stop strategy.

"I think one stop around here was a pretty competitive stint," he said. "The last stint I felt really strong on the soft tyre.

"It's just been a really challenging weekend," he admitted. "I'm glad it's over. A bit of a reset and go again."

It was during his first stint on the medium that there was a brief rain shower.

"It was definitely tricky when the rain started coming down," he said. "Again, if we knew how much rain there was going to be, we would have pitted onto the soft, and that's when you would have had the biggest difference in those challenging conditions."

Like his teammate, Russell complained of bouncing over the weekend.

"We suffered with a huge amount of bouncing today," he said. "A number of teams did, maybe not as severe as we did.

"It's obviously a bit of a shame to see that as a sport at the pinnacle of motorsport the majority of teams are still struggling with bouncing," he added. "I hope something can be solved in that regard in the future.

"But all in all, it was a good race. Both the races were competitive, opening that gap to P3 in the championship. But we're still focused on Red Bull and trying to close that gap."