George Russell says Mercedes must strive to understand the surprise pace that saw it take a 1-2 in the second practice session for Formula 1’s Bahrain Grand Prix.
Mercedes had taken encouraging signs from pre-season testing last week with its revised 2024 car as both drivers declared it was more benign than its predecessor.
Russell had cautioned that a compliant car doesn’t equal a fast car, but the German marque fronted the times in the sole representative practice hour of the weekend.
Under the twilight conditions, Lewis Hamilton stormed to the top of the order with a best effort of 1:30.374s, two-tenths ahead of Russell in the sister W15 machine.
However, Russell has claimed that Mercedes is remaining grounded despite its encouraging practice run, citing that Max Verstappen’s race pace remained superior.
“We’re not getting carried away with ourselves. The qualifying pace looked really strong, we still need to understand why it was so good,” Russell said.
“We made some changes from the test and it exceeded expectations. But ultimately, the long run pace is where it all happens and Max is still ahead of us.
“It was very close with Fernando [Alonso], Lando [Norris] and the Ferraris, Lewis and I were very similar as well, so we have a real fight on our hands.
“In race pace we were very pleased with the day, the car is performing really well but we’re not going to get carried away with the timesheets just yet.”
Mercedes had spent the predominant part of testing circulating on long runs until a late dash saw Russell propel himself to second place on the timesheets at the end.
When asked whether Mercedes looks stronger over one lap compared to this time last week, Russell replied: “I hope so.
“We need to sit down and understand where this increase in performance has come from, whether it’s a one-off, whether we can sustain this and what we need to do to fight for a serious position on Sunday.
“After testing Max looked a long way out in front, now that gap has reduced but he’s still out in front. I think he’s still got a healthy margin to the others, rather than just a ridiculous margin to the others.
“So, by no means does this mean we’re back or we can fight with them just yet.”
Hamilton agreed with his team-mate on both counts, stating that Mercedes has improvements to make across the long runs to become a contender to Red Bull.
“It’s a shock to see us where we are but we’ll take it for now,” Hamilton added.
“But we can’t get ahead of ourselves, we need to keep our heads down, keep working on the set-up and trying to extract more.
“I think a long run pace is nowhere near the Red Bulls, for example, so we’ve got some work to do that.”
Pressed to predict if he could be in contention for a podium in the race, Hamilton answered: “I think we’re going to be in the mix.
“It’s a bit too early to say, but I think we’re there or thereabouts with Ferrari and Ferrari and maybe Aston and McLaren.
“It’s going be a close, a nice battle. If Max is in the front, he will veer off as he has done for the last couple of years.”
