After a difficult last couple of race weekends, the Mercedes team appear to be starting off the F1 Hungarian GP weekend on a brighter note. Friday’s FP2 session had both George Russell and Kimi Antonelli finish inside the top ten positions. Russell finishing the session P7 and Antonelli P10, with only one tenth separating the teammates.
Russell insists more is needed for everything to come together
George Russell had a bit of a scuffle with Ollie Bearman in Turn 8 with 50 minutes left of the session. The rookie was on a fast lap coming up behind the Mercedes driver when Russell attempted to let him pass by going on the left hand side. There appeared to be a little miscommunication leading to some wheel-to-wheel action between the two drivers. Besides this moment, Russell’s session was quite straightforward.
“It always feels good when you’re a bit higher up the leaderboard. A bit of a strange day. The Aston Martins looked unusually fast today, they seemed to make a decent step forward. McLaren are obviously in a league of their own. We just need to find that last little bit for it to start clicking again for us.
“Today wasn’t a breakthrough, but it wasn’t like we were expecting it to be a breakthrough. We’re just going to keep chipping away.”
The 27-year-old expressed that the feeling in the car has improved from last week around the demanding Spa-Francorchamps track. With the driver feeling better in the car, the weekend already appears better for Mercedes.
“It definitely felt better to drive, more enjoyable to drive! We both had a bit more confidence. We’re looking at the top half of the leaderboard currently, than the bottom half so that’s an improvement upon Spa.
“We were on the medium tyres, so you probably wouldn’t be expecting to do a long stint on that. Deg, at least from my side, it seemed pretty high. It won’t be straightforward, I think a bit of weather is incoming tomorrow and Sunday, so had a few of those races recently.”
Antonelli gaining back confidence
Similarly, his teammate, Kimi Antonelli, appeared to be feeling better with the car early on this weekend. Finishing in the top ten during both FP1 and FP2 already has the rookie’s weekend looking better than last time out in Belgium. With the Mercedes drivers reverting back to the old suspension, Antonelli seems more comfortable in the car now.
When speaking in the TV pen, the 18-year-old expressed his satisfaction with the day, stating:
“Today was nice. I’m pretty happy because I’m getting the confidence back with the car.”
The Mercedes rookie continued on to explain that reverting to the old suspension has been immensely helpful. Antonelli appears more comfortable with the car, and even finished ahead of Russell in FP1, with the Italian being P7 and the Brit P8.
“Still missing a little bit to the guys in front, but I think we’re working well, we’ve been changing the car a lot because obviously it felt like a big step with the old suspension. The car was completely different and we’re just trying to rebalance the car. Long run was good in FP2, just the soft I had a bit of traffic last sector and the lap was not super clean but good feelings ahead of tomorrow.”
Additionally, the Italian expressed that his main focus is set on having a better qualifying session this weekend. As he qualified 18th at the Belgian GP, Antonelli remains hopeful for a better qualifying around Hungary.
“I think the long run has been good, even in the past. Now it’s going to be important to do a good qualifying, because here it’s important to have a good track position. So that’s going to be the main focus for tomorrow.”
