George Russell says Mercedes enjoyed its best qualifying pace of the year in Friday's session at the Red Bull Ring, but also its worst outcome.
Both Russell and teammate Lewis Hamilton went into the top-ten shootout with all guns blazing and with prospect of fighting for a spot in the first two rows.
But an uncharacteristic mistake by Hamilton saw the seven-time world champion lose control of his car's rear end as he entered Turn 7 and dart off into the barriers where his session ended in a cloud of dust and with his car looking the worse for wear.
However, when the session resumed after a lengthy red flag period, it was Russell's turn to indulge in an off-track, with the Briton's car swapping ends at the final corner and running backwards into the outside barrier.
Russell best lap up to then was good enough for P5 on Saturday's sprint race grid, but the Mercedes driver was understandably frustrated by his mistake and a botched opportunity to end up fourth in the pecking order.
"Two things: I could have been P4, for sure, I was a tenth up on my lap and absolutely went for it because I thought there was an opportunity for third," he said.
"As it turns out, probably not. But we just need to see how much damage is done. I’m sorry to the team and to the guys in the garage."
Despite his team's unsatisfactory end to its qualifying efforts, Russell reckons Mercedes has the pace to make up in the sprint race for its faulty qualifying.
"I think we ordinarily have better race pace than we do quali pace," he added. "We’re definitely there in the fight.
"As a team, probably our best qualifying of the year in terms of pace, but probably the worst in terms of outcome. That’s racing.
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"I’m personally going through a tricky couple of races, at the moment, but we’ve got tomorrow to make up for it.
"There’s definitely positive signs," Russell said, referring to Mercedes' consistent progress of late, both in absolute and relative terms.
"We know that we’ve brought some things to the car. We know that Ferrari and Red Bull were probably pushing the boundaries with the planks a bit more than the interpretation of the regulation and probably all these things coming together is coming in our favour.
"Not getting carried away, Lewis was doing a phenomenal job, he was absolutely flying today.
"I probably went in the wrong direction with my set up for qualifying but may be in a good place for the race. I feel okay, physically, I’m just a bit concerned about the car, if we can recover it."
Update:
Red Bull's Sergio Perez has had all his Q3 lap times deleted for leaving the track at Turn 8 during his fastest lap in Q2. The Mexican will thus start Saturday's sprint race P13, which moves Russell up to fourth on the grid.
Furthermore, Russell has received an update from the stewards for crossing the track without official permission following his Q3 crash.
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