George Russell baffled by ‘serious issue’ with engine causing speed deficit to Kimi Antonelli

SPA, Belgium — George Russell has revealed he is struggling with a “serious issue” on his engine that is resulting in a straight-line speed deficit to Mercedes teammate and Formula 1 title rival Kimi Antonelli.

Russell will start Sunday’s Belgian Grand Prix from third place on the grid, but qualified more than half a second behind pole-sitter Antonelli on Saturday at the Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps.

Russell had finished the session in fourth, but will move up one place on the final starting grid thanks to Lando Norris’ penalty.

After qualifying, Russell explained to reporters that Mercedes had been working to understand why there was such a difference in his and Antonelli’s straight-line performance.

“We saw this from Silverstone, we thought we found the problem, we thought it was something with the brakes, it wasn’t the brakes,” Russell said.

“Then we thought it was my driving style with the throttle. I convinced myself that it was something in me, the driving style. Now we’re very confident it’s not the driving style, and that there’s a serious issue at play here.

“The team are working so hard to resolve it, but every lap I do, when I see I’m down anywhere from two-tenths to six-tenths in the straights, it’s pretty infuriating.”

Russell, 28, was the preseason favorite for this year’s world championship, but currently trails Antonelli by 25 points at the top of the standings after scoring only two wins to the Italian’s five.

While 19-year-old Antonelli said after the session he built “good confidence” in his Mercedes W17 car in every part of the Spa circuit, Russell explained he’d spent the entire race weekend so far focusing on resolving the straight-line problem.

“You feel powerless,” Russell said. “We don’t know what’s going on. I don’t think it’s the (engine) to be honest. But there’s something slowing us down in the straights. As I said, the team are really, really on it now to try and solve it.”

Speaking to F1 TV after the session, Mercedes chief Toto Wolff said the team was “unable to explain” Russell’s lack of straight-line speed compared to Antonelli, but that it had “left no stone unturned” to try and remedy the problem.

“Is it the (engine)? Kimi has a brand new (engine) and this makes a difference? We will see on the next tracks because they will be less energy-starved so it doesn’t make a big difference, and then there’s a few tenths that George needs to find,” said Wolff.

“Lots of it he has already found, but over a few corners, there’s still two-tenths or two-and-a-half-tenths, so overall he has recovered well, but at the moment he doesn’t gel with the car and he hasn’t for the last two weekends.

“That’s probably not his fault, but we just need to bring it together.”

Russell trailed Antonelli by as much as 68 points at the top of the world championship after the Monaco Grand Prix, only for his win in Austria and retirements for Antonelli in both Barcelona and Silverstone to cause the gap to fall. In both of those races, Antonelli was on course to finish ahead of Russell before an issue emerged on his car.

The reason that Russell and Mercedes focused on his driving style was linked to the way that the new F1 cars for 2026 are driven, using a near-50/50 split between the combustion power of the engine and the battery.

If Russell were to struggle more than Antonelli through the corners and require more of his battery to keep up, it would leave him less energy to use on the straights compared to his teammate.

Russell admitted after qualifying it was “tempting” to try and overcompensate for the straight-line speed deficit through the corners, but that realizing a lot of the gap was due to the engine offered some comfort.

“I was pleased with my lap,” Russell said. “When I look at the corners, there was a lot of corners where I was faster (than Antonelli). There’s definitely corners that I needed to improve. The corners look like a normal fight you would have for a pole. The straights, it’s not.

“I don’t know what the solution is, but (I’m) praying ahead of Budapest we find it.”