Russell reflects on ‘pretty fun’ Sprint win in China as he admits being ‘caught off guard’ by Hamilton battle

George Russell was delighted to win a “pretty fun” Sprint at the Chinese Grand Prix, with the Mercedes driver admitting being “caught off guard” by his early battle against Lewis Hamilton for the lead.

Despite a good start from pole position, Russell lost out on P1 later in the lap when Hamilton made a lightning launch off the line to surge to the front from P4 on the grid. A close scrap followed in the next laps, before Russell eventually sealed the position.

The Briton went on to take victory, ahead of the other Ferrari of Charles Leclerc in second and Hamilton in third. When asked afterwards about the dicey opening laps – which were much like his early duel with Leclerc last time out in Australia – Russell responded: “Again, yeah!

“I just spoke with Charles, we were like, ‘Actually, this is pretty fun in the end'! A lot of strategy at play and how you do the overtakes. It’s not easy.

“I hope it was a fun race to watch – usually the Sprint races are pretty boring – and then I got everything under control, [then there was the] Safety Car, but really happy to win.”

Describing the difficulties that he faced from behind the wheel, Russell continued: “It’s really windy at the moment. It’s not easy because this first corner’s so long and it only takes one lap of pushing too much and you can destroy your front left tyre, so it was just sort of managing, and especially when we were battling.

“And Lewis did an amazing job in the early laps – he caught me off guard – but [that’s] 20 years’ experience, so I’ve still got a little bit to learn there!”

Given the close fight that Ferrari again put up, Russell suggested that the Silver Arrows may have to up their game further for the remainder of the weekend.

“I hope we can bring more, but yesterday was a really great day,” the Briton said. “Ferrari again seem to be offset in Qualifying but really close to us in race pace, so ultimately we probably need to find a bit of improvement for the race.”

On the other side of the garage it was an eventful Sprint for Kimi Antonelli. After dropping backwards at the start from P2 on the grid, the Italian made contact with Red Bull’s Isack Hadjar during the opening lap, later earning him a 10-second time penalty for causing a collision.

While he was able to climb back up the order, Antonelli served his penalty in the pits when the Safety Car was called following a stoppage on track for Audi’s Nico Hulkenberg, resulting in a final position of P5.

“It was a crazy race on my side,” the 19-year-old said. “Obviously with the start we need to check what happened, what went wrong – probably I think it was something on my side.

"Then when I released the clutch, I had no power, no momentum, but I think it was something on my side with the procedure, so I need to check on that.

“And then the pace was decent to be fair. Obviously I came back into P2, but then the Safety Car came out and I had to serve the 10 seconds and then fell back again. Now we look forward to Qualifying.”