George Russell makes startling admission after Monaco GP spiral

George Russell is in "a very weird state of mind" following a Monaco Grand Prix which snowballed away from the Mercedes driver.

Russell eventually finished 12th in Monaco as team-mate Kimi Antonelli won a fifth straight grand prix after penalty drama centred around a pit-lane speeding penalty.

Russell was initially handed the five-second sanction for speeding, on a day multiple drivers were pinged for the same offence, but at his pit-stop under the late safety car after Lance Stroll crashed, did not serve the five-second wait before being serviced.

Under the rules, this was then converted to a drive-through penalty, which Russell served at the end of the first racing lap after the red flag restart. 

However, as the field was bunched up, he fell from third place to 13th on the road, before moving up to 12th after Sergio Perez's penalty.

A second successive non-score, coupled with another Antonelli win, means the Italian is 68 points ahead of Russell after six races on 156 against 88, with Lewis Hamilton moving up to second on 90. 

Reflecting on a day of misery, Russell explained that he was in a "weird state of mind" and that the situation he finds himself in after years of toiling in non-race winning Mercedes, "painful."

"I still very much believe in myself and know what I can do, and we're not even 30% of the way through, but there have been a lot of points down the drain," Russell told media, including RacingNews365.

"I am in a very, very weird state of mind because I've had very low moments in my career where maybe I've had a run of two or three bad races on my own personal performance, but I've never had a run of bad luck such as this.

"It didn't happen when the car was P7 two years ago, or a P3 or P4 car last year, and now I've got the car, it feels very painful, but there is still a long way to go. 

"I still very much believe in myself and that we're going to be fighting for race wins until the end of the year, but right now, it is tough. 

"When I look at things objectively, when things are balanced out a little bit, I still think I'll have been very close, and have at least two more victories.

"I know that qualifying was a bad day for me, I accept that, but the result of the last two races, I wish I could take some responsibility for the car breaking down in Canada, or the penalties [in Monaco], but it is completely outside of my control, and that is an incredibly difficult pill to swallow. 

"I don't believe in good or bad luck, but when I look at the season as a whole, I was leading the race in Canada, and broke down. 

"I could have been on the podium [in Monaco], and zero points, I was leading in Japan, and the safety car came out 10 seconds after a pit-stop. 

"That's not a lot, and the whole season could look totally different with 70 more points."