"Don’t demonise people" - Red Bull employee calls out fans insinuating Mercedes favoring George Russell over Lewis Hamilton

Red Bull employee Calum Nicholas has defended rival Mercedes on social media after fans insinuated that the team was favoring George Russell over Lewis Hamilton at the 2023 Japanese GP.

The German team did not have a great Japanese Grand Prix weekend as Lewis Hamilton and George Russell finished P5 and P7, respectively. Instead of fighting their rivals, both Mercedes drivers found themselves on the same piece of tarmac on more than one occasion throughout the race.

George Russell took the strategy into his own hands and attempted a very bold one-stopper while Lewis Hamilton was on a two-stop optimum strategy. Many felt Russell would have been a bit disappointed that he did not finish ahead of his experienced teammate despite having a faster pit stop.

Some fans claimed that Mercedes may have been favoring Russell over Hamilton during the race. But Red Bull's Senior Technician Calum Nicholas has now clapped back at these comments on social media, claiming that the teams work really hard and that people should not "demonize" them.

He wrote on X:

"Oh come on now. Do you know what it takes to get it right every single time? It’s a feat of human performance and pit crews have way to much pride to do what you’re suggesting. Don’t demonise people who are all working really hard, it’s not fair."

Mercedes Trackside Engineering Director explains the reason behind switching their drivers at the end

Mercedes Trackside Engineering Director Andrew Shovlin, meanwhile, said that since George Russell was on a one-stop strategy which was clearly slower than the two-stopper, they had to switch him with Lewis Hamilton. This was done so that they didn't lose position to the fast-charging Ferrari of Carlos Sainz.

As per F1.com, Shovlin said:

"At the end of the race, the odds of George holding back Sainz were relatively small because his one-stop strategy left the Ferrari with a sizeable tire advantage. The reason that we committed to that strategy though was that we had very little to lose. He had no threat behind Sainz; it was a difficult strategy to pull off and he did a good job.

"Ultimately though, the tire degradation was too high to make it work. Given this, we had to protect Lewis from losing the position to Sainz, as he was the more likely car to finish ahead, and therefore gave the instruction to invert the cars on track."

It will be interesting to see if the two Mercedes drivers are in agreement with the logic given by the team for swapping the cars at the end of the race.