Mercedes boss praises George Russell for podium finish despite numerous issues with his car.

Despite holding off a determined Lando Norris, Russell had to wait an agonising couple of hours to see if he would be penalised for 'illegal' use of his DRS. The stewards eventually gave the Mercedes driver the green light admitting that no advantage had been gained.

Toto Wolff was understandably full of praise for the Briton, especially as the errant DRS was just one of the issues he was dealing with.

"The brake-by-wire failed suddenly," revealed the Austrian, "and then it took a while to find the settings to kind of reset it.

"But we did that, and then, to be honest, him managing the system coming in and out while having Norris behind him. It's just an unbelievable drive, to be honest," he admitted.

"What he did today... he secured this podium on top of that. Taking the soft for such a long time was also created between managing and then attacking when he needed to. And I think it's probably whoever, if you haven't driven a race car that has a BBW or conventional brake, it's like on a road car when the power assisted steering fails.

"And then imagine you have to adjust between one corner having it and the next one not having it, that was just a very good skill."

Asked to clarify what exactly Russell has lost, brake-by-wire, GPS or DRS, the Austrian replied: "The whole lot.

"I think on the dash we didn't have all the things that we expected," he continued, "and we also feared that we would lose the whole dash, which would have meant no buttons, no ways to run any of the settings and obviously he had it in the shift lights, and he had it in the back of his mind and it didn't take his concentration away."

As for the decision not to punish Russell for his 'illegal' use of DRS, Wolff explained that there already existed a precedent.

"It has happened before back in 2018," he said. "There have been examples of needing to manually override and inadvertently opening being no further action.

"It doesn't mean that's the case here," he added, "but there are precedents for it.

"It opened and closed. There wasn't any benefit. The system failed and we hope it will be alright. We don't know the cause yet. Maybe some wiring looms in the car, or maybe it was triggered by the F1 system failure and it caused our system to go bananas."

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READERS COMMENTS

1. Posted by Pavlo, 12 hours ago

"George drove a great race, congrats!
But I personally think FIA should have punished him for the DRS. While I in general agree it’s a pity to punish for the honest mistakes, we all know what happens if FIA uses „common sense“ instead of the rules.
Especially in this case, even a justification sounds weak. How can they measure how much he gave away in the next corner? If he would have lifted a throttle on a straight, it would have been obvious, and yes acceptable, but but how can you measure in a corner? He went slower compared to what exactly, and how do we know it wasn’t a simple mistake caused by confusion on pressing the wrong button? It’s minor, but FIA again allowed it to be controversial.
"

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2. Posted by Rock Doc, 15 hours ago

"Outstanding drive from George on Sunday. While his car seemed to be falling apart around him, he still managed to fend off the fast Norris to claim a well deserved second.

George is have a great season and is proving to be a real championship contender if Mercedes can get a little more out of the car."

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Wolff full of praise for Russell

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