Lewis Hamilton lets George Russell field Mercedes questions from media

George Russell

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Mercedes CONFUSION sparked as Hamilton lets Russell take team questions

Tom Clarkson spotted something very interesting at the Australian Grand Prix

Joe Ellis

Wednesday 12 April 2023 20:45

Tom Clarkson believes George Russell has now become the "spokesperson" for Mercedes instead of Lewis Hamilton.

The journalist conducts official FIA press conferences at race weekends and has picked up on some reluctance from Hamilton to answer questions directed at both Mercedes drivers.

This was particularly apparent after qualifying at the Australian Grand Prix when both Russell and Hamilton qualified in the top three and joined Max Verstappen for the post-session media questioning.

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Hamilton is the senior figure in the team having won seven world titles but Russell is where Mercedes see their future once Hamilton decides to retire.

Keeping his powder dry

“In the press conference [in Australia], after qualifying, they’d qualified second and third in Melbourne. Max, of course on pole,” Clarkson said on the F1 Nation podcast.

“And every time a question was posed to both of the Mercedes drivers, Lewis was quite happy for George to answer the question.

“He almost became the spokesperson for the team in that press conference. And I was interested as to why Lewis was happy to just sit back and let that happen. I don’t know whether he’s sort of keeping his powder dry.

“Is he trying to sort of give him a sort of false hope of being the dominant person, and then he’s going to really hit him hard where it matters most on the stopwatch later on?

“I don’t know what his thought process was. But it was interesting anyway, to observe that he very much let George be the man.”