2026-02-03 12:07:42
George Russell would love to go head-to-head with Max Verstappen for the F1 title in 2026.
The Mercedes driver has revealed that he hopes to challenge himself against the Red Bull driver and McLaren’s world champion Lando Norris when the new season gets underway next month and is not fazed by the team’s tag as pre-season favourites.
Russell said at the launch of Mercedes’ new car on Monday (02.02.26): “I do want to go head-to-head with Max and obviously Lando had a great season last year but, no, it didn’t add any more pressure.”
The British racer explained that last week’s pre-season test had gone well for Mercedes but he was also impressed by the performance of rival teams, particularly Red Bull.
He said: “Probably the fans and people were expecting potentially Mercedes versus McLaren because there was a lot of anticipation that Mercedes would clearly have the best power unit.
“But it seems like the other power-unit manufacturers have done a good job and we know that Red Bull have always had an amazing car. Even through the years of dominance of Mercedes, it was their engine that was letting them down not their car and we obviously know how good Max is. So I think he’s very much going to be in the fight this year and that is great.”
The sport has introduced new technical regulations this season but Russell feels that speed will still come out on top over engineering.
The five-time Grand Prix winner said: “The faster driver will be the one who still comes out on top. I don’t think it will be an engineering race from the cockpit.
“Definitely still is Formula 1, it still very much feels like a race car and you’re still very much pushing the limits but you are driving it differently.”
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