During the race weekend in Saudi Arabia, Mercedes will introduce some minor updates to the car, but according to George Russell, time will still be needed to make the W14 a lot faster.
With a fifth fastest time for Russell during the second practice session and an eleventh fastest time for Lewis Hamilton, it already became clear on Friday that Mercedes normally does not compete for victory in Jeddah either. Russell asks for time to ‘make up for time’.
“We collected a lot of data to analyze from Friday to Saturday,” said Russell. “We will try to maximize our package and get the car set-up in the sweet spot.”
“As much as we’d like to, given all the hard work everyone puts into it, we know we’re not going to find a second overnight.”
“Red Bull is clearly at the front but we are learning a lot about our car. What we learn helps us to improve in the short and medium term.”
“As always during practice sessions you are also not sure about what engine settings are being driven, we will find out on Saturday.”