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George Russell has backed Lewis Hamilton to come good as soon as he finds his footing at Ferrari. The 7x F1 world champion left Mercedes at the end of last season and joined the Italian team.
The driver was a part of the German squad for more than a decade, and moving from such a long relationship can be hard and could play a role in adapting to the new team. Lewis Hamilton's start to life at Ferrari has been a bit of a rollercoaster.
There is the high of securing pole position in the sprint at China and then going on to win as well. At the same time, there's the other side of the coin, where Lewis Hamilton has been seen operating at a considerable deficit to Charles Leclerc in both qualifying and races.
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The situation was so dire that after qualifying in Bahrain, Lewis Hamilton apologized to Ferrari for not being able to perform at the level he would like to.
George Russell was questioned about how he thinks his former teammate has fared at Ferrari, to which the Mercedes driver felt that Lewis Hamilton should be given time to adapt to the new team. He insisted that once that is done, the driver is capable of brilliant results. He told the media, including Sportskeeda:
“I don’t really know, to be honest. After Fernando [Alonso] he’s the most experienced driver on the grid, a seven-time World Champion and he’s an incredible person and racing driver."
He added:
“We saw it in China, second race of the season, on pole in the Sprint, wins the race comfortably. I know what he’s capable of, and it’s not easy going into a new team and the competition is tough, but he’s an amazing driver and I’m sure, when things start to click, as they did in China, we’ll see more of that magic.”
Lewis Hamilton's teammate on his championship aspirations this season
George Russell himself has had a strong season with Mercedes so far. Ever since Lewis Hamilton left the scene, Russell has taken over and has been very consistent. At this stage, he's fourth in the championship, only 14 points behind the leader, Lando Norris.
The driver was, however, pragmatic when talking about his title aspirations, as he felt that Mercedes did not have a car capable of battling McLaren regularly, and hence a title bid is far-fetched. He said:
"My aspirations are to fight for the World Championship and, being realistic, we don’t have a car to fight McLaren. They could probably have finished first and second in every race this year, but they’ve given the rest of us a few opportunities."
He added:
“Myself and Max [Verstappen] have jumped on the podium probably one too many times because of a few little errors and we’ll take it, but I don’t imagine those errors continuing for 24 races.”
Hamilton, on the other hand, has had a muted start to life at Ferrari. The 7x F1 champion is down in seventh in the championship standings at the moment compared to his teammate Charles Leclerc, who is in fifth.
