George Russell had a positive initial reaction to lining up third for tomorrow’s F1 Saudi Arabian GP.
Coming into qualifying, George Russell looked to be the lead challenger to the two McLarens at the Saudi Arabian GP. Q1 and Q2 demonstrated this further, as his W16 swept through the fast-flowing Corniche Circuit. However, in Q3, the Red Bull of Max Verstappen found significant pace as the final runs started. Although Russell took provisional pole, he was forced to settle for third after Verstappen and Oscar Piastri jumped him in the closing seconds.
Speaking in Parc Ferme after qualifying, Russell said he was ‘happy’ with his lap, and could not have extracted much more from his car.
“To be honest, before the session I would have definitely taken a P3. But when I just saw how close it was, I was really happy with the lap. But you always think there might have been a little bit more in there.
“But being realistic, I think this was probably the maximum today. We know on these sort of high-speed circuits, we probably don’t quite have the pace of the McLarens. And obviously, Max did an amazing job again. So, congrats to him.“
We saw you lose out potentially a bit with the track evolution, doing your lap a little bit early. Do you think you could have maybe had a bit more at the end of the session then
When asked if he had lost out as a result of the track evolution, Russell said the red flag, caused by Lando Norris’s dramatic crash, resulted in just one flying lap for the Briton.
“It was a really tricky session, obviously, with the red flag in the middle of a session, and we had to, you know, that one lap at the end was all that counted. It was quite interesting seeing the Red Bull do the two laps. But as I said, P3 is a great place to start. And it’ll be a long race tomorrow.
