“Never thought he would beat Lewis Hamilton,” Ex-F1 Team Boss regrets underestimating George Russell, claims he is Mercedes’ future Champ
Former F1 team owner Eddie Jordan gave his remarks on George Russell's flying performance at Mercedes.
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Till 2021, George Russell seemed to be stuck at a team where they were not even tapping into the F2 Champion’s full potential. Although his mates from the Formula 2 days went to teams like McLaren and Red Bull, George had to struggle because of low funding and a sudden ownership change at Williams. Fast forward to 2022, George debuted at Mercedes as his childhood idol Lewis Hamilton‘s partner as Valtteri Bottas left the Brackley outfit. On top of all that, he surpassed Hamilton in his debut year with the team, closing 2022 with 35 points more than his veteran teammate.
George Russell came into Mercedes as a saving grace while Lewis Hamilton was failing to achieve a race win time and time again. While Lewis had his first-ever winless season last year, George attained Mercedes’ only Grand Prix win through 2022 at the Sao Paulo GP. All this reassured the critics that the Silver Arrows have made the best pick when they chose to recruit Russell. Now, even former F1 Team Boss Eddie Jordan admitted he was wrong to underestimate Russell as the Briton has ‘completely blown him away’.
When George Russell was at Williams, he came quite close to scoring points at quite a few Grands Prix, but he always went home with disappointment. In his final year with the team, he did manage to scrape off a few points, but that never gave Eddie Jordan enough reassurance that he would be a good hire for Mercedes. Jordan said, “I got it wrong with George. I saw him in the Williams and I thought, ‘are they really going to sign him? Is that really what’s going to happen?“
Eddie Jordan gives full marks to George Russell for his efforts Mercedes
Now, Lewis Hamilton has started his 2023 season with somewhat better performances than last year. He has built an advantage over George Russell after his podium finish in Australia. But Eddie Jordan believe George Russell is Mercedes’ future. He admitted he had doubted Russell, and now he said, “He absolutely blew me away. He did. And full marks, hands up, I got that wrong. I never thought he would do what he’s doing, and I never thought that he would be beating Lewis.”
With Russell’s 40 points on the Championship table and Lewis’ 56, Mercedes have amassed a total that is still less than their own customer team Aston Martin Racing. In the next few races, the Stuttgart-based team’s main goal would be to outperform AMR so that they can get the second position on the Constructors’ Rankings. Now, it remains to be seen whether Toto Wolff’s team accomplishes this feat, or if they fail to stand up to Aston Martin’s star racer Fernando Alonso.
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