George Russell acknowledges a tough road ahead for Mercedes to catch Red Bull, describing the team’s challenge as “a mountain to climb”.
Mercedes kicked off its 2024 campaign a reasonably good race in Bahrain where Russell outpaced teammate Lewis Hamilton in qualifying and on race day which he concluded in fifth position.
But in Saudi Arabia, a major weakness of Mercedes’ new W15 was exposed for all to see: the design’s instability and subsequent lack of pace in high-speed corners.
In Jeddah, the Brackley squad’s deficit was such that its car was among the slowest in the circuit’s fastest complex of corners, even slower than Alpine’s troubled A524, the field’s laggard.
However, Russell remains optimistic about Mercedes' chances of producing a good result in Melbourne where the team has historically always performed well.
The Briton suggests that the Silver Arrows squad might even be closer to a breakthrough than current results might indicate.
“We’ve gone well here the last two seasons,” Russell told the media on Thursday. “We qualified second and third here last year, we were fighting for the win at one point.
"We’ve learned so much from the first two races. I think we are definitely going out tomorrow to test a lot of things on the car to get a better handle on how to get the most out of this.
“There’s the softer compound of tyres this year which Ferrari tend to go pretty well - qualify well on the C5 tyre. If you take the Red Bull out of the situation, it’s really exciting that battle right behind them.”
While some heavy-duty work awaits Mercedes, Russell remains convinced that a team’s relative performance can change quickly in F1, as Aston Martin demonstrated last year, suggesting that his team can still claw its way back in to contention.
“Ultimately, we’re not here to fight for P2,” he added. “We want to be fighting for the victory and we know it’s a mountain to climb.
“It swings very quickly in this sport. Going through our meeting this morning, seeing the Aston Martin on the podium.
“If somebody said after the first six races last year they’d finish P5 in the championship you wouldn’t believe it. I think that just goes to show how quick things can change.”
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