Mercedes
George Russell, P2
"It's always special to stand on the podium at Silverstone, and after a few years where luck hasn't really been on my side at my home race, it's nice to finally get a result to celebrate in front of these fans. It is always one of the most special races on the calendar for me. The support here is incredible, the fans are so passionate, and racing in front of a home crowd is something I'll never take for granted. I'm grateful for all their support and delighted we could at least give them a podium to celebrate.
"It was a race with a whole range of emotions today. At times we were unlucky, and in the end, we got a little bit lucky as well. The Safety Car played in our favour because everyone behind me had fitted fresh tyres. Had we gone racing again, I probably would have lost at least one position, so I'm glad it finished under the Safety Car and allowed us to bring home P2.
"It wasn't a particularly strong weekend from our side. I've been trying to understand for a while why I'm struggling, and although today felt slightly better, there are still a lot of things we can improve. I could feel the slow puncture developing during the race and lost around five or six PSI over a lap and a half, which made the car feel increasingly unbalanced. Putting that aside though, there's still work for us to do to understand where we're missing performance. We will analyse all the data before we head to Spa so we can come back stronger."
Kimi Antonelli, P15
"Today was one of those days where everything seemed to go against us. We had really strong pace in the race and it felt like we had the speed to close the gap and fight for the win. That's what makes the end of our race so frustrating. We didn't get the opportunity to properly battle for the victory but sometimes these things are out of your control.
"The damage happened very suddenly. I was taking the same kerb every lap, but on that particular lap I ran it and immediately lost front downforce. The car wasn't driving straight anymore and the pace dropped away. I knew part of the wheel shield had broken, but there seemed to be more going on than we could see at that moment. We will analyse everything and understand exactly what happened.
"Despite all the setbacks, I kept pushing and trying to maximise every opportunity. That's always my mindset. Even when it felt like everything was going against us, I was still fighting to grab that one point before the Safety Car changed things. I know I gave everything I had and we will come back stronger. The support from the fans has been amazing this weekend and I'm already excited to bounce back in Spa."
Toto Wolff, Head of Mercedes-Benz Motorsport
"That was a dramatic race. We are super happy for George as he has not quite gelled with the car as he would have liked this weekend. He has shown great resilience though, kept working hard and even after the puncture that took him out of the fight for P3, battled back. We were hopeful that the Safety Car would stay out at the end as we had Lewis (Hamilton) right behind on fresh tyres and so it proved; a first home podium here at Silverstone is a well-deserved result.
"On the other side, it was an unfortunate race for Kimi. He showed great pace and would have been a strong contender for victory before the wheel shield failure. We weren't 100% clear what the damage was and once we worked it out, we thought that was his race done. He did well to maintain P10 on track but the Safety Car, as he still had to serve a five-second time penalty, went against him.
"We will now reset and recalibrate before heading to Spa and Hungary for the final double header before the summer break. We are in a strong position in both championships but know we can't afford to continue suffering from these reliability issues. That is something that all of us are working hard to get on top of and improve."
Andrew Shovlin, Trackside Engineering Director
"Well done to George for recovering from the puncture to finish P2 at the flag. He was in a close race with Max (Verstappen) and Lewis (Hamilton) when we spotted a slow puncture on lap 33 and had to come in for new tyres. At that point it looked like he was very much fighting for the podium, so it was disappointing to drop to P6 but then a bit of a surprise to gain the place back to the Ferrari at the final Safety Car. He showed good resilience and kept a cool head to take his first home race podium.
"Kimi had a very unfortunate race. His start wasn't as good as yesterday, but he was able to pass Lewis on track and was closing Leclerc towards the first stop. We delayed pitting him to generate a tyre life advantage and once onto the Hard tyre, it looked like we would catch him in just a few laps. We then suffered a sudden wheel shield failure which felt to Kimi like the suspension had failed. We made a couple of stops to understand and improve the issue, and even then he was on track to finish in the top 10 but the Safety Car finish, combined with the penalty for leaving the track during the problem, dropped him out of the points.
"Overall, there have been some frustrations this weekend. We've faced some issues within our control, some outside of them, but we'll review where we need to improve and hopefully come back stronger in Spa."
