George Russell has dismissed the notion he is bothered by not being touted as an F1 drivers’ championship protagonist.<\/p>\n
The British driver has claimed three podium finishes to start the year and sits fourth in the title fight, 14 points adrift of Lando Norris out front.<\/p>\n
However, his name is often omitted from discussions about which drivers’ are ultimately in the running for this campaign’s crown, with Oscar Piastri and Max Verstappen more regularly talked up as contenders.<\/p>\n
When asked whether he felt he was not being rightly taken into consideration, the three-time grand prix winner’s response underlined how unperturbed he is by being overlooked.<\/p>\n
Insisting all he can do his perform to his limit, Russell highlighted that Mercedes’ lack of championship pedigree in recent years makes it natural to not be included in such conversations.<\/p>\n
“Ultimately, from my side, I\u2019m just going in every single weekend trying to perform to the maximum,” he told media including RacingNews365<\/strong>.\u00a0<\/p>\n “These last three years as well, alongside Lewis [Hamilton] \u2013 his name was always there with championships because he\u2019s the GOAT [greatest of all time].<\/p>\n “But the last three years, neither of our names were there because we weren\u2019t in the position to fight.<\/p>\n “Look, this season it\u2019s been a great start to the year. I don\u2019t think we could have achieved a better result than we expected, and I hope we can continue this sort of run of consistency. But we know realistically the McLarens are exceptionally strong, and I think it\u2019s going to be challenging for anybody else to compete with them.<\/p>\n “But, we saw last year how dominant Red Bull were, and suddenly they weren\u2019t at the end of the season. So yeah, things change quickly.”<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\tRussell: ‘I’m not looking for external recognition’<\/p>\n Having somewhat sidestepped the first question on if he should be considered a championship challenger, Russell was asked more directly whether he was annoyed about being overlooked.<\/p>\n Although, again, the Briton showed himself to be unfazed by it, stressing that he does not need the “external recognition” of being earmarked as a title fighter.<\/p>\n “I mean, not really, to be honest…” he replied. “I\u2019m a Formula 1 driver living my dream. It\u2019s not what the perception is – it\u2019s what the reality is. The reality is if we\u2019re going to fight for a championship this year, we need to improve.<\/p>\n “This year has been a great start to the season. But the same way the last three seasons have been, I feel that I\u2019ve personally performed very well.<\/p>\n “I\u2019ve had one of the strongest teammates ever. I\u2019m not looking for external recognition. I\u2019m just looking to go racing every single weekend, perform, and doing my job.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"George Russell has dismissed the notion he is bothered by not being touted as an F1 drivers’ championship…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25411,"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-25410","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\/114349014001431674","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25410","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=25410"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25410\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25411"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25410"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}