George Russell hands FIA extraordinary praise after F1 rule changes

George Russell has heaped extraordinary praise on the FIA, revealing that its collaboration with the drivers on the rule changes has been the best it has ever been.

The FIA held several meetings across April to discuss possible changes to the new power unit regulations, with drivers, teams and stakeholders involved.

Meetings were always planned by the FIA to take place after the opening rounds, with the unscheduled break following the cancellation of races in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, creating a perfect opportunity for discussions.

Drivers were involved in some of the talks, with Russell, a director of the Grand Prix Drivers' Association (GPDA), revealing that their ideas were taken on board.

According to the Briton, had the drivers been involved in the creation of the regulations in the first place, incidents like the one in Japan between Franco Colapinto and Oliver Bearman would not have happened.

Addressing dramatic closing speeds was a key area of focus in Russell's eyes.

Asked if he felt the drivers were listened to by the FIA, Russell told the media, including RacingNews365: "I think there's been some really good conversations, to be honest, with the FIA and a number of drivers, and I think they have listened to the concerns.

"It's definitely the most collaborative they've ever been in this regard, which is positive. I think we concluded that they want to include us more when it comes to future regulations as well, because we suggested that we could maybe foresee some of these issues before they actually came to fruition.

"And if we were involved in the process, we could have helped, for everybody's sake. So that's been positive.

"I think the changes are good, with the main goal being to remove the large closing speeds as we saw with Franco [Colapinto] and [Oliver] Bearman. And I think with these new rules, that incident wouldn't have happened, so that's a positive."