George Russell’s future has been a subject of interest with a season of changes approaching Mercedes, but Lewis Hamilton has an opinion on the matter
Lewis Hamilton thinks a Mercedes partnership of Max Verstappen and George Russell would strongly compete with him and Charles Leclerc at Ferrari.
Hamilton, 39, will leave the Brackley-based team at the end of the current F1 campaign before linking up with the red brand. It’s currently unclear what team principal Toto Wolff has decided to do about filling the seven-time world champion’s position.
It’s been rumoured that he is desperate to sway a potentially unsettled Verstappen away from Red Bull. The idea of moving Russell into Hamilton’s seat and promoting junior driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli has also been mooted. Russell, 26, is relaxed about his future but recently broke rank by slamming the performance of his Mercedes car this week.
Guenther Steiner and ex-Mercedes driver Nico Rosberg have warned Russell that he may not be in the secure position to lambast his motor publicly in the same way as Hamilton, citing that Wolff could decide to replace him entirely. As uncertainty around the team continues to build, Hamilton believes Russell would work well with Verstappen if the reigning champion decided to leave Red Bull.
Hamilton recently said: “Well, obviously George is an integral part of this team and he’s going to be here for the long haul. He’s doing such a great job, and he’s going to grow into the leader of the team.
“So it would be interesting to see. I don’t know what their relationship [Verstappen and Russell] is like, but I’m sure they’d work it out. It would definitely be a strong line-up, of course, similar to what we have in my next team [Hamilton and Charles Leclerc at Ferrari].”
Hamilton’s comments proceeded Russell’s recent douse of brutal honesty, where he slammed the inconsistency of his car this season. He said: “The problem we’ve got with this car at the moment is you think it’s not going to bite you, and you can achieve a really great lap.
“Then, suddenly nothing changes, or you feel nothing changes, and the following lap you lose all of that performance. Without a doubt this is probably the most inconsistent our performance has been as a team in probably forever.”
Russell is two points above seventh-placed Hamilton, who has endured one of the most frustrating campaigns of his career to date. Mercedes won three out of four races before the summer hiatus but has only managed a podium finish once in the last seven races.
Poor form has only added more curiosity into who Wolff will appoint to catch up with the likes of Ferrari, McLaren and Red Bull. Rosberg recently said that Wolff may look to bring in the best in the business, which could leave Russell’s seat vulnerable.
He said: “George Russell is not safe at all because Toto still wants Max and he will try again for 2026. ‘Give up’ does not appear in Toto’s vocabulary.
“So if Max does become available and I do think it’s a possibility, then it is a shootout between George and Kimi next year. And it’s a lot of pressure on George because he has everything to lose. He should be the one ahead because Kimi is 18 and completely new. It’s not an easy situation for George.”
