George Russell frustrated by Mercedes ‘baby steps’ in pursuit of F1 rivals

Russell finished fifth at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, though was some way behind the leading quartet of Red Bulls and Ferraris

George Russell believes that Mercedes must make quicker progress to challenge in the 2022 F1 season (Getty Images)

George Russell has admitted that Mercedes must improve in “leaps and bounds” rather than by making “baby steps” if they are to challenge in 2022.

The German team’s slow start to the new Formula 1 season continued in Saudi Arabia, with Russell finishing a credible fifth, though some way short of challenging the lead quartet.

Red Bull’s Max Verstappen took his first victory as defending world champion ahead of Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc as the two early pace-setting manufacturers filled out the first four places.

With teammate Lewis Hamilton only able to claw his way up to tenth after qualifying down the grid, the race in Jeddah served as another reminder of just how far Mercedes are behind their potential title rivals.

Russell said afterwards that his new outfit are “struggling to find the silver bullet” that would cause immediate improvement.

“The car felt good, honestly,” Russell said. “We maximised the balance, we know what we’re lacking and that’s downforce.

“Pushing flat out, I was really pleased with the performance from my personal side. It was really managed and I did my best to keep up with the Red Bulls, especially after the restart.

“But we’re a second behind them, generally, and we’ve got work to do. We have a better handle of the race pace than the quali[fying] pace, but the inherent issues are still there.

“When I look at the result we finished 30 seconds behind - I think there were 30 laps after the safety car [following Nicholas Latifi‘s crash] - so that’s how far behind we are.

“We’re continuing to learn but at the moment we’re making baby steps and we need to make leaps and bounds.

“We’re struggling to find the silver bullet to resolve our issues. I’ve no doubt when we do that, we’ll find a chunk of lap time, but it’s easier said than done.”

George Russell finished fifth in Saudi Arabia (Getty Images)

The 2022 season continues in Australia on 10 April.

The Melbourne race returns to the calendar after being cancelled in each of the last two years due to Covid.

Russell’s predecessor Valtteri Bottas won the last edition in 2019, but a repeat Mercedes victory would appear unlikely unless significant fixes can be found for a number of problems - and particularly ‘porpoising’, the bouncing of the car that occurs when downforce increases and then rapidly decreases.

“We are trying to develop the car around the issues, but we need to solve the underlying problem which is the porpoising,” added Russell.

“There are so many factors at play when we’re balancing it. We change the setup and we think it’ll improve, and sometimes it makes it a little worse.

“We’re still learning and we’re still far from optimal. If we solve the porpoising, we’ll solve 99% of our issues.

“We can’t get anywhere close to where our rivals are running and as far as a timeline [for fixing], I have no idea.”