George Russell Faces Tech Challenges in China’s Grand Prix

Motorsport photo Qualifying in China went anything but smoothly for George Russell after he suffered a front-wing breakage in Q2 and then briefly halted on track at Turn 5 during Q3. Russell had won the earlier sprint race from pole position but looked far less assured during what proved to be a fraught qualifying session. Mercedes says it is still investigating the cause of the issue which caused Russell's car to go into anti-stall mode shortly after leaving the garage, halt on track, and then remain stuck in first gear after he got it started again.

With time ticking away, the team essentially had to resort to the time-honoured IT department strategy of turning the car off and then back on again: running through various default settings, swapping the steering wheel and effecting a reset. When the car was fired up again it was still stuck in first gear, but another reset enabled it to drop into neutral and engage gears normally again. Russell departed the garage with just over two minutes on the clock and managed to place his Mercedes second on the grid, 0.

222s off team-mate Kimi Antonelli. "It was just a crazy session from the end of Q2," said Russell. "The front wing broke and the team weren't sure if it had broken or not.

I was pretty convinced it had, and there was a bit of stress around that and changing the front wing. "And then as soon as I went out on the track, I could tell something wasn't right, stopping on the track, trying to restart the car. It didn't restart.