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Antonelli claims hat-trick of wins to pile pressure on Russell
Lando Norris felt he ought to have won.
By his own admission, George Russell has never much enjoyed Miami’s Hard Rock Stadium circuit. After qualifying fifth here on Saturday, Russell said the low-grip challenge posed by what amounts to a tour of gargantuan parking lots around the Miami Dolphins stadium did not suit his “smooth, precise” style, adding that he much preferred the challenge of high-grip circuits such as Saudi Arabia. “It’s something I want to work on, but there are three tracks out of the 24 that are outliers, and Miami is definitely top of that list,” Russell said.
The Briton’s feelings towards this place will not have been helped one iota by this race, or indeed this weekend as a whole, which found him once again out-qualified and outperformed by team-mate Kimi Antonelli.
How long ago that maiden win for Antonelli in Shanghai feels now. Then, an Antonelli win felt like a novelty. Toto Wolff, the Mercedes team principal, cautioned everyone not to read too much into it. “He’s young, he will make mistakes, he’s not a championship contender, don’t put too much pressure on him” was the gist of Wolff’s message.
It is Russell who is feeling the pressure now.
Antonelli made it three wins out of three here on Sunday, becoming the first driver in history to win his first three grands prix from his first three pole positions. Not a bad run of form. Good enough to convince the bookmakers to instal the teenager as the new favourite for the drivers’ title overall.
That feels harsh on Russell, who suffered from bad luck in both Shanghai and Suzuka without which he might have been leading the title race coming here. And there are reasons for Russell fans to remain confident. The 28-year-old may not like Miami, but he enjoys Montreal a lot more, so expect him to bounce back strongly there.
The trouble both Mercedes drivers have is the fact that McLaren, Red Bull and Ferrari have closed the gap so significantly over the last few weeks.
Lando Norris felt he ought to have won. And perhaps he should have. After a typically mad, celebrity-fuelled Miami grid – including the bizarre sight of Jimmy Fallon eating Martin Brundle’s microphone – McLaren’s reigning world champion emerged victorious from a typically frantic 2026-style start, full of “yo-yoing”. He looked very comfortable in the lead, too.
Norris, though, was undercut by Antonelli when the Italian pitted one lap earlier than him mid-race, and he was never able to catch back up to the Mercedes on his hard tyres. “How did we not win this? We should have won,” Norris muttered over the radio on his cooldown lap after crossing the line some three seconds behind. “We should have boxed first,” he added later.
Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, too, rued what might have been. After qualifying on the front row, Verstappen spun 360 degrees on lap one, tumbling down to 16th. He drove a brilliant recovery race, diving into the pits on lap seven for a set of hards after a safety car came out following a spectacular shunt involving Alpine’s Pierre Gasly, who was flipped upside down by Racing Bull’s Liam Lawson.
Verstappen managed 50 laps on those tyres, eventually finishing fifth after he was passed late on by McLaren’s Oscar Piastri and by Russell, albeit he gained a position back on the final corner after Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc lost his steering following a shunt of his own. But it might have been a lot better if the forecast wet weather had materialised and everyone had to pit again.
Leclerc was also cursing his luck. The Monegasque led the race at various points, only to tumble down the order to sixth following a mad final lap in which he spun and clipped a wall, losing position to Russell and Verstappen. He was later handed a 20-second penalty post-race for leaving the track and gaining a lasting advantage, dropping him to eighth.
While Ferrari’s pace does not quite look a match for Mercedes or McLaren – Lewis Hamilton eventually finished sixth following Leclerc’s demotion, having sustained damage to his floor and right sidepod after a collision at the start with Alpine’s Franco Colapinto – neither they nor Red Bull can be fully counted out yet.
After Australia, it felt as if the title was Russell’s to lose. After Japan, it felt like a two-horse race between the Mercedes pair. After this weekend, all bets are off. “It would be silly not to feel confident for the future after the improvements we have made,” Norris admitted.
Mercedes are still the overwhelming favourites, though. They have their big upgrade package to come in Montreal, a circuit which, as mentioned previously, they love.
There is also a school of thought that they might have been holding back on performance in order to try to convince the FIA not to allow their competitors any extra development on the power units through the ADUO [Additional Development and Upgrade Opportunities] mechanism.
Russell needs a big one. A post-race investigation for a collision with Verstappen late in the race was dismissed by the stewards, but it summed up a messy weekend for him.
“It was a tough race,” he admitted. “I made some pretty big changes to my differentials and brake bias, very close to what Kimi has been using all weekend, and they had a bigger impact than I thought, but still it wasn’t a good weekend. This place has always been really tough for me.”
Wolff said not to judge Russell too harshly. Miami has always been a “bogey track” for him, the Austrian said. You cannot really afford to have bogey tracks if you want to be world champion. The pressure is on Russell now and he needs to respond.
[Source: Daily Telegraph]
