George Russell reveals major change after 'gut' feeling triggers miracle

George Russell has revealed a late change to his qualifying approach after securing a second-placed grid slot for the Mexico City Grand Prix, with the Mercedes driver admitting his "gut" feeling helped him pull off a lap he could not fully explain in Q3.

Russell set a 1:16.523 at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez, just 0.009s behind pole-sitter Lewis Hamilton and ahead of Ferrari's Charles Leclerc, Kimi Antonelli and Red Bull's Max Verstappen. 

It marked a rare high point in what the Briton himself described as an inconsistent campaign, with team-mate Antonelli set to clinch the world championship in Mexico City.

The King's Lynn-born driver looked comfortably quicker than his 20-year-old team-mate, something he has been unable to say since winning in Baku.

Discussing how the lap came together, Russell told select media, including RacingNews365: "Not easily at all, to be honest. It's a little bit of a story of my season. 

"I think this kind of feels like I've never done an average lap. It's either a terrible lap or a very strong lap, and this is quite frustrating."

"I don't think there was a single lap this whole weekend ahead of Q3 that I looked in the mix to even fight for the top three, let alone pole position. 

"But that last lap just came together really nicely. I'd love to know exactly why, but I don't have those answers. And, yeah, I'll take it."

George Russell insists he 'never doubted' personal performance

Qualifying on the front row was an example of what Russell is so easily capable of when he is feeling comfortable, although it has happened far too rarely in 2026.

Russell also explained a tactical switch behind his final run, revealing he had pushed to skip the customary preparation lap before his flying lap in Q3.

Asked about his change to not do an additional preparation lap at the end of qualifying, Russell explained: "Yeah, that was probably the biggest thing that I changed. I saw Lewis and Charles and Max as well. They weren't doing the prep lap. 

"We were doing prep laps, just getting the temperature of the tyre. It's quite challenging. My gut told me we could do it on lap one without the preparation, but the team wanted to do the prep, so we ended up carrying the fuel for an extra lap."

"You know, it's such a small number, but it's bigger than the gap to pole. So, it's obviously... you always think retrospectively, if only we had the one lap of fuel rather than the extra lap of fuel that we had, we could have been on pole."

"But, you know, I'm very grateful to be in this position because it's been a tough run. And, like I said straight out of the car, I know it's in there. I've never doubted that it's in there. It's just understanding why this season we can't achieve it as consistently as I have done in the past."