{"id":504731,"date":"2025-10-16T17:51:48","date_gmt":"2025-10-16T17:51:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/504731\/"},"modified":"2025-10-16T17:51:48","modified_gmt":"2025-10-16T17:51:48","slug":"george-russell-opens-up-about-his-childhood-anger-and-anxiety","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/504731\/","title":{"rendered":"George Russell opens up about his childhood \u201canger and anxiety\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mercedes<\/a> driver George Russell<\/a> has opened up about hardship in his karting career as a child, and his father\u2019s sacrifices as he made his way to Formula 1.<\/p>\n

Russell delved into his youth in a column for The Players\u2019 Tribune, explaining how lonely he felt due to much older siblings having left the family home and his father working from dawn past dusk to fund his burgeoning career.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy father worked in agriculture and ran his own business,\u201d the Briton wrote. \u201cHe was working all day every day in order to support my racing dreams. He was gone to work before I woke up, and by the time he was back I was usually in bed. So whenever we weren\u2019t at the track on the weekends, I was always kind of in my head wondering, \u2018Where is my dad?\u2019.<\/p>\n

Read Also:<\/p>\n

\u201cI have a brother, Benji, who\u2019s 12 years older, and my sister, Cara, who\u2019s 13 years older. So growing up, it would really just be me and my mum at home. At night, the birds would always be chirping, but they didn\u2019t sound like nice birds you know? It sounded like a haunted house. Every so often I would be watching TV by myself, and I\u2019d just get scared.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnce the sun set, it got kind of eerie. If I saw a pair of headlights going by the window it was literally like, \u2018What\u2019s going on??\u2019 One single car, and I\u2019d be on edge. Any noise, any creak in the house, I\u2019d think, \u2018Something\u2019s happening\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was afraid of my own shadow, basically. And I probably didn\u2019t even realise it at the time, but looking back, I was a bit of a lonely kid.\u201d<\/p>\n

Russell also experienced racing drivers\u2019 typical struggles when it comes to making friends at school, which Esteban Ocon can certainly relate to<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t have many friends at school because every weekend, when other kids had birthday parties or would go around to friends\u2019 houses, I was at the racetrack,\u201d the 27-year-old added. \u201cEventually the invites stopped coming. I knew the reason of course, but my focus was just elsewhere. It didn\u2019t mean that I had no desire having mates, as we all do. Of course I did.<\/p>\n

\"George <\/p>\n

George Russell, Alex Palou, Dorian Boccolacci<\/p>\n

Photo by: CIK\/KSP<\/p>\n

\u201cAt first, I thought I could make friends with the other drivers, but I learned early on that you can\u2019t really be friends with your rivals. And go-karting was pretty brutal, because you were racing wheel-to-wheel, and you were banging and bashing every other corner, so you ended up having fall-outs with half of the grid. And then the parents were having fall-outs between each other, and that trickled down to the kids. So it became quite an isolated life.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I didn\u2019t really think too much of school to be honest because even by that age I knew where I wanted to be. People always ask me how I felt when I was younger, missing out on all this fun stuff and sacrificing so much of my childhood. For me it was no sacrifice \u2014 it was a decision. I wanted to be on the racetrack. I wanted to be racing. I wanted to be winning.\u201d<\/p>\n

Many young karting drivers harbour Formula 1 hopes, but very few eventually make it, so Russell\u2019s father Steve was extremely demanding \u2013 first of all with his manual stopwatch, due to the absence of live timing. The youngster was baffled by his poor pace in testing, given he won many races.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt took me probably six years to realise what was happening,\u201d he explained. \u201cThen I finally figured it out: my dad was purposefully clicking the stopwatch late. He was adding seconds to my time. He wanted me to always think I was just a bit slower than I was.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven when I was winning everything, I could always push myself further. Always a little further.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor probably 10 whole years of my career, I looked on every single lap to see where my father was standing. I was always looking for the expression on his face, looking for his satisfaction. And I don\u2019t know\u2026 it just seemed like he was disappointed more often than he was proud. He always wanted more from me. I think he knew what it takes to be in one of those 20 [F1] seats.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt takes… everything.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"George <\/p>\n

George Russell<\/p>\n

Photo by: CIK\/KSP<\/p>\n

The pressure to succeed eventually got to Russell, with any setback carrying a heavy weight on his juvenile mind.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had a little motorhome that we\u2019d travel in to get to the races every weekend,\u201d Russell recounted. \u201cWhen I did well we were like a big happy family.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut let\u2019s say I was overtaken on a corner or made a little mistake, that journey home would feel like the longest ride in the world. We\u2019d pile into the van for our six- or seven-hour drive back to Norfolk and just be sitting in silence for a really really long time. Blistering silence. Picture like a tea kettle on the stovetop.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was probably the hardest part. As a kid, you see and feel all that and feel like you\u2019ve caused it.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs soon as we got back to our house I would run up to my room. All this anger and anxiety would ball up inside me. I\u2019d just get this itch like I had to go, you know what I mean? I had to get out of there, or I was going to spiral.\u201d<\/p>\n

Having won numerous karting competitions and Britain\u2019s Formula 4 championship, Russell eventually landed a meeting with the Mercedes F1 team leaders<\/a>, which secured his future in motorsport.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn that crazy moment when my childhood dream came true, I thought of my father,\u201d the Englishman said. \u201cI couldn\u2019t wait to tell him every detail.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd I don\u2019t know what I expected, but his reaction was surprising in a way. He didn\u2019t hound me with all these questions\u2026 He didn\u2019t even ask to come to the meeting. He just congratulated me, and we hugged. It almost felt like I\u2019d been in a cage for so long, and he\u2019d been taming me and making me who I am. Then as soon as Mercedes signed me, he kind of handed me over and let me fly.\u201d<\/p>\n

Photos from United States GP – Thursday<\/p>\n

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\"Franco<\/p>\n


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\n United States GP – Thursday, in photos
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\"Liam<\/p>\n


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\"Nico<\/p>\n


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\n United States GP – Thursday, in photos
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\"Charles<\/p>\n


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\n United States GP – Thursday, in photos
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\"George<\/p>\n


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\"Andrea<\/p>\n


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\"Lewis<\/p>\n


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\"Pierre<\/p>\n


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\"Isack<\/p>\n


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\"Franco<\/p>\n


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\n United States GP – Thursday, in photos
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\"Carlos<\/p>\n


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\"A<\/p>\n


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\n United States GP – Thursday, in photos
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\"Nico<\/p>\n


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\"Esteban<\/p>\n


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\"Alexander<\/p>\n


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\"Lando<\/p>\n


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\"Oliver<\/p>\n


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\"Pierre<\/p>\n


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\"Gabriel<\/p>\n


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\n United States GP – Thursday, in photos
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\"Franco<\/p>\n


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\n United States GP – Thursday, in photos
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\"Lewis<\/p>\n


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\n United States GP – Thursday, in photos
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\"Isack<\/p>\n


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\"Charles<\/p>\n


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\n United States GP – Thursday, in photos
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\"Esteban<\/p>\n


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\n United States GP – Thursday, in photos
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\n <\/a>
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\"Lando<\/p>\n


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\n United States GP – Thursday, in photos
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\"Oliver<\/p>\n


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\n United States GP – Thursday, in photos
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\"Pierre<\/p>\n


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\"Graeme<\/p>\n


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\n United States GP – Thursday, in photos
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Read Also:<\/p>\n

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– The Motorsport.com Team<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mercedes driver George Russell has opened up about hardship in his karting career as a child, and his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":504732,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[163541,707,9824,165488,4859,79,16,15,163611],"class_list":{"0":"post-504731","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-circuit-of-the-americas","9":"tag-formula-1","10":"tag-george-russell","11":"tag-george-russell-opens-up-about-his-childhood-u201canger-and-anxietyu201d","12":"tag-mercedes","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom","16":"tag-united-states-gp"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115385123991999203","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/504731","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=504731"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/504731\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/504732"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=504731"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=504731"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=504731"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}