George Russell believes McLaren's impressive Silverstone qualifying performance will translate into the British Grand Prix. A raft of updates has transformed the MCL60, allowing Lando Norris to finish in a season-best fourth place in last weekend's Austrian Grand Prix. McLaren's upturn in form continued in qualifying at Silverstone, with Norris and teammate Oscar Piastri setting the second and third-fastest times, beaten only by runaway championship leader Max Verstappen. Having been out-qualified by both McLarens, Mercedes driver Russell told media, including RacingNews365.com : "Surprised by them, they've done an amazing job. "Not too sure where all of that performance has come from, even last weekend and their race pace was fast. "That's going to be the interesting one because you often see teams quick on a Saturday and go backwards on Sunday. "I have a sneaky feeling that won't necessarily be the case with McLaren."
Russell hopeful of podium fight
Despite talking up McLaren's prospects, Russell added that a series of improvements to his W14 over the weekend meant he felt confident of fighting for a podium finish. "After FP2, strategy had us down as 17th and 18th quickest in single lap work, and third and fourth quickest in the race pace, so the only thing different between those two were the tyres," said Russell. "We've made some really good improvements [between Friday and Saturday], frustrated to see we're only half a tenth from P3, that would have been an amazing result. "I felt happy with my lap. Lewis [Hamilton, Russell’s teammate] has been pushing me really hard all weekend, [but I] stayed calm, it all came together on that last lap, and there's no reason we can't fight for P2, P3."
Most read
