Mercedes driver George Russell is not in favor of a so-called ‘reversed grid’ during sprint races. This is being considered to increase the spectacle during an F1 race weekend.
“I don’t speak for the drivers but my own personal opinion is that reverse grids are not going to work,” Russell gives his opinion on the idea of the reverse grid. “Just because I learned that when I drove in Formula 3 and Formula 2.”
“When you have the ten fastest cars, the most difficult car to overtake is the one you are competing with.”
“When you then invert that grid you have the fastest car in tenth place trying to overtake the second fastest car in ninth place, which in turn tries to overtake the third fastest car in eighth place. So every car tries to overtake its nearest competitor.”
According to Russell, Formula 1 will be confronted with a ‘DRS train’ in a so-called ‘reversed grid’.
“What you’re probably getting is a DRS train,” Russell said. “For example, you will see a Williams driving in front of a Haas, which does not really get past it smoothly, which then drives in front of an Alpine and behind it a McLaren or something like that. I don’t think the concept will work.”
According to Russell, more attention should be paid to sprint races and tire wear. After all, this season we had some very interesting and exciting sprint races.
“The best sprint races were the ones with either tire wear like in Qatar, or riders on different strategies,” Russell reflects. “Same in Brazil, the tires lasted about 25 laps, whatever caused it, it was a good race.”
“But usually during sprint races you get riders who are all on the medium tire and who go all the way to the finish and then you don’t get a nice race.”