George Russell delivers surprise 'underachieved' Mercedes verdict

Mercedes' George Russell believes the Brackley-based squad "underachieved" at the Australian Grand Prix, despite taking a 1-2 finish.

Russell emerged victorious in Melbourne last weekend, leading home team-mate Kimi Antonelli to commence the season in strong fashion.

It marked the sixth win of the Briton's career as he took hold of the championship lead for the first time.

Mercedes' pace advantage over the field had been rumoured for some time ahead of the introduction of new regulations, and it was a reality realised on Saturday in Melbourne when it was eight-tenths ahead of its nearest rival.

However, there were elements from the race weekend that Russell felt Mercedes was lacking.

"It just feels like another race win, to be honest," Russell told media including RacingNews365.

"We're race one into a very long season.

"Of course I want to fight for race wins week in, week out, but we're all here now to fight for a world championship, and that's what we've been working so hard towards.

"And if we want to do that, we still need to raise our game because there were a lot of areas that we underachieved, mainly around the race start, having the battery in the right place, and we were lucky not to come worse off."

Drivers must be 'strategic' with energy

Russell's race start saw him lose the lead to Charles Leclerc, who soared from fourth to first on the run to the opening corner.

Across the following laps, Russell and Leclerc traded blows for the lead of the race as they played with their energy deployment.

Russell highlighted it was a key insight into how strategic drivers are having to be with the new power units.

"There's definitely more opportunity and you do have to be more strategic," he said.

"I think on a circuit like this where you have four straights and you've got to split… Let's say you've got 100 per cent of battery, you've got to split that between four straights.

"No team is splitting that 25 per cent per straight. Some teams are doing it more on one straight, some other teams are doing it more on the other.

"If you use your overtake mode, your boost button, you will pass the driver in one straight and he will then pass back.

"So it was dicey for the two of us, but I hope you enjoyed it."