Mercedes has been left scratching its head after a challenging start to the Belgian Grand Prix weekend, but George Russell insists the team’s difficulties are unrelated to the W15’s recent floor upgrade.
Russell and Lewis Hamilton were both left frustrated after Friday’s opening day of running at Spa, with led to the Brackley squad reverting to its previous floor specification after struggling with a new version in the opening two sessions.
On Saturday, both Mercedes drivers made it to Q3 in a wet qualifying session. Hamilton was able to secure a third-place grid slot for Sunday’s race, benefitting from pole-winner Max Verstappen's 10-place penalty.
Russell, who will launch his race from sixth, insists Mercedes’ improved performance was not down to the floor change.
"No, not at all. We have struggled here the last three years and the fluctuation in performance of all the teams circuit to circuit is pretty substantial," Russell explained.
"I think it was important for us to revert to something we know and see in the race tomorrow whether it is a challenge with Spa for us, because we are pretty confident it is, as opposed to the upgrade.
"The upgrades were nothing substantial, they are just part of the development over the course of the year – we're pretty confident those upgrades were working as expected."
Russell admitted to being perplexed by Mercedes' inconsistency, highlighting the team’s strong performance at Silverstone compared to its struggles at Spa, despite the similarities between the two tracks.
"It has been three years in a row that we have been very quick in Silverstone – obviously this season exceptionally quick – and struggled at Spa," Russell explained.
"On paper, you would say they are not exactly the same types of circuit but they have high-speed [corners] here, a bit of low-speed, the same as Silverstone. We need to try and understand why that is.
©Mercedes
"There seems to be something inherent in the cars that work at certain circuits. Red Bull are always flying here, as an example, this is always their strongest circuit of the season, along with Austria.
"For us, Silverstone and Barcelona are the sort of circuits we tend to go very well at as well. So we need to understand that one."
Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff echoed Russell’s comments, admitting that the team made mechanical set-up errors on Friday that contributed to the car’s poor performance.
"We know that we did a few things wrong yesterday," the Austrian told Servus TV.
"We changed that on the car and rebuilt it. And today the drivers said it was much better. We think it was more of a mechanical thing where we messed up."
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