Russell believes Williams is faster when it isn't pushed to the limit
F1 News
- Jake Williams-Smith
George Russell says Williams' 2019 car may well be faster when not being pushed to its limits. So far in 2019, Williams has been rooted to the back of the grid with a car much slower than the rest of the field.
Russell, who has so far outperformed his teammate Robert Kubica since the beginning of the season, believes that the 2019 Williams car may not be unable to overcome a poor design and therefore both drivers are better off going slower in races.
“There’s definitely room to improve from my side. Certainly, I haven’t managed to optimise qualifying in the last two races," he told Motorsport.com.
“I think I still need to understand and respect the limitations of the car. Sometimes you would go quicker driving at 98% than at 100%.
“It’s a learning process to understand the car and, unfortunately, we can’t just go out and get the maximum from it because we’re not 100% sure what the car is going to do from corner to corner.”
Aside from crashes and mechanical retirements for other drivers, Williams has ended every session in 2019 down the bottom of the order unable to overcome a large deficit to the rest.
Earlier in the season, Kubica was told to stay off the kerbs in Bahrain due to a lack of replacement parts for the team. With Baku upcoming, the team will be hoping for another race full of carnage which they are able to navigate and take home a positive result.