Russell 'exceeded Monza expectations' with second row

George Russell felt that he had exceeded his own expectations by taking fourth place in qualifying for the Italian Grand Prix and securing a spot on the second row for tomorrow's start.

“Definitely very happy with P4," he told the media in the paddock after the end of the session. "Slightly exceeded expectations. Straight from the outset we were P1, and P2.

"The engineers did a great job overnight and we hit the ground running this morning, I felt more comfortable in the car.

“Feeling good," he confirmed. "Especially my side of the garage. We set the car up more for the race than we did in qualifying, that’s why I’m very pleased to be P4.

Russell had been third on the grid last weekend in Zandvoort, but that was without any Ferraris getting in front of him. That wasn't the case this weekend where Carlos Sainz flew to pole ahead of Max Verstappen and Charles Leclerc.

“Ferrari seem to be very competitive this weekend," Russell acknowledged. "Don’t really know where they’ve come from! I think we'll have better tyre degradation so we have a chance of fighting for a podium if we make a good start."

• Read also: Sainz gets it done, delights Ferrari fans with home pole

Russell suggested that this weekend's Alternative Tyre Allocation system - which requires drivers to use hard tyres in Q1, medium tyres in Q2, and finish off with the soft compound in Q3 - had been a factor.

"You need to be dynamic in this new qualifying format as you jump down the tyre compounds, and I think we did a good job managing it today," he said. “Unfortunately we didn’t improve later on but it just goes to show how important the tyres are.

"This was a session that just shows how you need to get every detail right in F1: in Q1, I didn't get the tyre in the right window and was P13. We didn’t change the car from Q1, but then in Q3 we ended up P4. Funny old game sometimes.

"With the softer tyre compounds Pirelli have brought here, I think there's the option to tune the set-up more aggressively for qualifying or favouring the race pace a little bit more. We've done the latter, so I hope it pays off tomorrow."

"Now it's full focus on the race and I hope we can challenge for the podium."

His achievement was in contrast to that of his Mercedes team mate Lewis Hamilton, who was only eighth fastest in the final round after admitting that he'd been slow from the start of the weekend.

"That wasn't the greatest session ... Not fun," was Hamilton's pithy summary of the day. "A real challenge. I was just slow from the get-go. It started off great in FP1, and then it just got away from us.

"Didn’t feel the car underneath me, and I can’t pinpoint what it is," he admitted. "But very slow today," adding that this had often been the case with the W14 this season.

"Always with this car, pretty much all the time," he sighed. "Think I’ve only been able to pinpoint it once with this car.”

"We started off the weekend well in FP1 on the first run, then it feels like things have got more complicated and I just haven't found the sweet spot with the car," he aded. "It was improving through qualifying and we made it to the top ten, but I still didn't have the feeling I wanted on the final run."

Now the only question is what he will be able to salvage tomorrow in race trim when the lights go out.

"We know how close the times are in qualifying, and that also translates to very similar race pace, which can make it hard to make up positions through the field, especially early in the race.

"George did a great job today to get on the second row, and I hope I can make progress forwards tomorrow."

Keep up to date with all the F1 news via Facebook and Twitter