George Russell forced to run ‘Miami-spec’ floor after ‘unnecessary’ crashes

George Russell has revealed he’s been forced to run a floor that was last raced in Miami back following his run of “pretty unnecessary” crashes.

Russell has crashed heavily twice in two races, leaving him without Mercedes’ new upgrade.

Due to a shortage of parts, the British driver is running a ‘Miami-spec’ version of the floor.

Even so, he still managed to comfortably out-qualify Mercedes teammate Lewis Hamilton, who is running the new upgrade.

The seven-time world champion was puzzled by the lack of pace from the new package, stating: “It will be interesting to get a reading because I’m obviously on the upgraded car, which should be quicker. But I don’t think it is.”

Speaking after qualifying in Mexico, where Crash.net are present in the paddock, Russell admitted P5 was the best he could have done given he’s running older parts on his car.

“Yeah, FP1, we're still trying to wrap our heads around why that was so good,” he said.

“Today was a really, really good day, you know, to attempt from P3 on a floor that we raced in Miami, I don't know, 14 races ago now. I don't think we could have done much more.”

Russell lost control of his Mercedes at Turn 8 in second practice, resulting in a lengthy delay to the session.

The two-time F1 grand prix winner was adamant that his recent run of crashes aren’t a result of “over-driving” but the fact that “the car bites”.

Reflecting on his crash on Friday, he explained: “Well, we know exactly what happened. I mean, you look at the Red Bulls, they just run over that kerb like no problem.

“The last two years, I've been using that kerb every lap. In FP1, I did four laps using the kerb and there was no problem. And then suddenly, well, you saw the replay, I hit it and it was like I was a kangaroo.

“And, you know, that was really disappointing. The last two weeks, I've put so much pressure on the team now with lack of spares. And it's been pretty unnecessary, but we don't really know why it's happening. It's not through sort of over-driving, it's just the car bites.”