Russell ‘gutted’ to miss out on maiden pole position by small deficit

George Russell admits he’s “gutted” to have missed out on his first career pole position by just 0.026s, as he was beaten by Mercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottas in Bahrain.

Russell was called up to Mercedes earlier this week after Lewis Hamilton returned a positive Covid-19 test, and spent the race weekend learning the procedures and the W11 car at his new team.

Having not made it into Q3 before during his time with Williams, Russell says he got his final lap on Saturday “all together”, leaving him disappointed to miss out on the top spot.

“It’s been incredibly intense, so much to learn getting used to the car, the seat, everything,” Russell said.

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“Just so different. It felt really alien to begin with. It’s just a really different way of driving to be honest, trying to unlearn what I learned at Williams and relearn how to drive this car fast.

“I tried a lot of things in FP3. And it didn’t go well at all so to be honest I’d have been happy just to get into Q3 after final practice.

“But really pleased, we got it pretty much all together in the final lap, obviously gutted to miss out on pole by 20 milliseconds but if you told me last week I’d be qualifying P2 on the grid next week, I think I wouldn’t believe you!”

However, the 2018 Formula 2 Champion is expecting a challenging race as he comes to grips with competing at the front of the grid – something he hasn’t yet experienced in F1.

“I’ve got nobody in front of me tomorrow which I’ve not experienced for a long, long time,” Russell stated.

“It’s going to be tricky, it’s going to be really tricky. Qualifying is what I feel most comfortable with, it’s just balls out everything you’ve got.

“Tomorrow you need a bit more control, a bit more finesse. And I just haven’t had the experience yet. So, giving it my all, let’s see what we can do.”