Improvements here or there, George Russell is not expecting a miracle from Mercedes in Monaco. He is convinced that red cars will set the pace on a street course.
In many ways, Monaco is an unusual and iconic location for the racing calendar – although it has more and more street tracks. According to many, this weekend could bring something special from a season point of view: it could dampen the strengths of a hitherto dominant Red Bull that Max Verstappen suffers his first defeat of the year.
At the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix, George Russell predicted Red Bull would win all this year’s races, but when it came to the Duchy, he seemed to have a slightly different view of the situation. When the M4 Sport Asked by his on-site reporter, dám Szeleczky, if he felt he had a chance against Red Bull on a slow street track, he began to consider the chances of a competitor, not Mercedes…
“I think Ferrari will be the best this weekend. They have been very fast here in the past, and now we go for the softer tyre, the C5, which they are always good at.”
– stated the Briton, emphasizing that Scuderia has often been competitive in Monaco over the past ten years.
He is not alone in his opinion. Red Bull advisor Helmut Marko also pointed out that Ferrari is their first opponent ahead of the weekend. “From what we have seen so far, Ferrari are sometimes faster than Red Bull in slower corners. However, their biggest advantage is that they can warm up the tires quickly. This could be crucial in the qualifying round.” – thought the Austrian.
So Russell feels that Red Bull is weak, but at the same time he fears that it will be difficult for Mercedes to exploit this.
“For Mercedes, Monaco and I have never been the strongest duo in the past. Not even when Mercedes was the best car. But we don’t design our car to be fast in Monaco, because that’s not the average.”
“So whether we had a good or bad weekend, we won’t see much in it. We obviously strive for the best possible result, but we will only be the judge in Barcelona.” said the one-time winner of the race.
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Refurbished car, wrong test site
Besides the evaluation, he also noted that the W14 has been significantly revamped this weekend. Originally, they planned to test their car with the new side box, front suspension and floorboard at the canceled Imola race, but in the end it turned out that the test would take place under unusual conditions.
“It’s not often that you put upgrades on your car, so we’ll keep in mind that we may not learn much about upgrades this weekend. We’ve been waiting a week for this. At the same time, we firmly believe it will improve our performance.”
Russell said cautiously.
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The most obvious change to the car is that Mercedes finally has a true side box. The team parted ways with the Zero Box concept after about a year and a half. However, according to their competitor, this will not be the final decision. “Other, that’s for sure. But there’s no magic bullet. We simply wanted to check that box so we could say we got it, and we could rule it out. The car has definitely improved, but whether or not we’ll feel it this weekend is another matter. But Barcelona is a great place to prove ourselves, to see how we stand up to Aston Martin, Red Bull and Ferrari. So we’ll put this weekend aside and see how good he is in Barcelona.” – summed up.
