Three-time F1 race winner Johnny Herbert has labelled George Russell as an underdog in the ongoing title fight.<\/p>\n
Russell has enjoyed a strong start to the season, scoring four podiums in the opening eight rounds – marking his best run to open a new campaign.<\/p>\n
The Mercedes driver currently sits fourth in the championship, 62 points down on standings leader Oscar Piastri.<\/p>\n
McLaren has had the strongest start to the campaign with six wins in eight grands prix, placing it at the head of both title races.<\/p>\n
While the Woking-based squad has largely had the measure of the rest of the field so far, Herbert sees Russell as a minor threat in the long run.<\/p>\n
\u201cGeorge Russell could be an underdog for the championship,\u201d he told Fruity King. \u201cHe’ll need a bit of luck.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe consistency that he’s got has been, I think, very impressive. And he’s got that hard edge.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHe’s had it from very early on in his career. He has always been very, very confident. And I think we’re seeing the confidence in the cockpit.\u201d<\/p>\n
Russell stepped up to a team leader role this year following the exit of Lewis Hamilton to Mercedes, with rookie Kimi Antonelli joining him at the squad.<\/p>\n
As the 18-year-old continues to get up to speed in F1, Herbert thinks Russell is already seeing the threat Antonelli could pose.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe’s always got to keep an eye out for his team-mate, because I think George is beginning to be aware of Kimi Antonelli,\u201d\u00a0Herbert added.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe needs to make sure that he is the one the team is going to be supporting. You’ve always got to be the one that everybody will trust.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd they trust George because he’s delivering very consistently.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Three-time F1 race winner Johnny Herbert has labelled George Russell as an underdog in the ongoing title fight.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":133886,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4103],"tags":[859,4199,1076,1074,1077,1075,997,707,4200,998,1073,1072,1071,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-133885","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-f1","8":"tag-daniel-ricciardo","9":"tag-f1","10":"tag-f1-calendar","11":"tag-f1-live","12":"tag-f1-results","13":"tag-f1-standings","14":"tag-ferrari","15":"tag-formula-1","16":"tag-formula1","17":"tag-lewis-hamilton","18":"tag-max-verstappen","19":"tag-motorsport","20":"tag-racing","21":"tag-sports","22":"tag-uk","23":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114575514269314402","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133885","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133885"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133885\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/133886"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133885"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133885"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133885"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}