"You have to be there at the end to pick up the pieces" - George Russell 'pleased' to take P3 at 2022 F1 Azerbaijan GP

George Russell has secured his third podium finish of the 2022 F1 season this weekend at the 2022 F1 Azerbaijan Grand Prix. The Mercedes driver finished behind the two Red Bulls in third position.

In a post-race media interaction, Russell admitted that it has been a tough season for the team and that the P3 result is a massive positive. He said:

“As you said before you have to be there at the end to pick up the pieces. Thank you to all the team back at Brackley and Brixworth for getting the car to the end. It is not easy this year with everything going on, the cars are going through a torrid time with the bouncing and pleased to bring home P3.”

Earlier, the Briton had qualified fifth-fastest in Saturday's qualifying session. He then significantly benefitted from Carlos Sainz's hydraulic issues and Charles Leclerc's power unit problems during the main race that resulted in a double DNF for Ferrari.

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George Russell optimistic for Mercedes' future in 2022

Despite the struggles faced by Mercedes so far this season with the new 2022 regulations, George Russell is positive that the Silver Arrows will soon have the potential to challenge the likes of Red Bull and Ferrari at the front of the grid.

He, however, admitted that the top two teams currently do hold a significant pace advantage over Mercedes and that he does not expect things to change overnight. Given the progress made by the team ever since the season-opener in Bahrain, though, Russell is optimistic about the future.

At the drivers' press conference ahead of the Azerbaijan GP, the 24-year-old said:

“Hopefully it would be faster. But I think I don’t think it’s necessarily much faster at the moment but it’s given us a direction where we think we can get a lot more out of it, whereas the car we had in Bahrain, that was sort of its maximum potential, and we couldn’t really improve it from there on in. Sometimes you got to take a small step back to take three steps forward. And I think we’re in that transitional process at the moment. And I think it’ll be a few more races before we started to see us hopefully fighting with the Ferrari and Red Bull.”

Mercedes currently stand third in the constructors' standings with 161 points to their name.