George Russell: I’m not going to blame Lewis Hamilton for DNF at Belgian Grand Prix

Russell’s Mercedes became beached in the gravel, and another DNF on his scorecard will be a major blow to his 2026 Formula 1 title aspirations. His teammate, Kimi Antonelli, powered to a masterful victory and bagged maximum points, extending his championship lead over Russell to exactly 50 points after ten rounds.

Many, including Russell, called it a racing incident. However, the FIA race stewards saw it differently and handed Hamilton a five-second penalty for causing the collision. Nevertheless, it was an unwelcome early shower for the Mercedes driver, who had been chasing Antonelli all weekend.

During Saturday’s Qualifying session, Russell finished half a second behind his 19-year-old teammate. This after Russell admitted he began to question his own driving style. Whatever the case, it is fair to say that the younger driver has the older one rattled at this stage of the F1 world title contest.

However, Russell revealed that his problems began well before his contact with Hamilton, with the Mercedes driver losing significant electrical energy coming out of La Source and consequently being swallowed up on the run towards Les Combes.

Starting from P3 on the grid at Spa-Francorchamps, Russell told reporters: “It all started from the build-up. I came out of Turn 1, and, for whatever reason, I was 30 to 40% down on my battery, and I just got totally swamped by three cars.

“The incident with Lewis, I’ve not really seen it. I thought it was probably a racing incident. I’m not going to blame Lewis. If things were normal, I wouldn’t have even been battling with Lewis. I’d have been battling with Kimi and Max ahead.”

The retirement continued a frustrating sequence of setbacks for Russell, whose title challenge has been compromised by technical trouble and missed opportunities during the opening ten rounds of the season.

He added: “It’s one thing after another, after another, after another. So, try and reset again. I’ve done it enough times this season, and we’ll see what we can do.”

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff backed Russell and insisted that the collision itself should be regarded as a racing incident, despite the stewards deciding Hamilton was predominantly responsible.

Wolff insisted: “George has our 100% support. George tried the outside, late braking, and it should have been his corner, but that’s a racing incident. These things can happen whether you are at the front, middle or back of the pack.”

The Austrian admitted Russell had endured a difficult weekend, but suggested his deficit to Antonelli during Qualifying could partly be attributed to a problem with his Mercedes power unit.

He explained: “George had a difficult weekend. Probably half of it will be attributed to the power unit that wasn’t as good as it should have been on his side, and the other half maybe to the driving. But we are in this together. We all make mistakes. Today, it was a mistake that the team made; another day, it will be a mistake by the driver. We just need to minimise it and support each other.”

Wolff confirmed that every Mercedes-powered car had suffered from reduced straight-line performance at Spa-Francorchamps. Russell was particularly vulnerable because of the battery deficit he carried out of the opening corner.

He continued: “We had an issue on all Mercedes engines. We lacked power on the straights. That hit him badly, and it 100% goes on us.

“We are trying our best as a team. We have the most powerful power unit and a strong car that is capable of winning. Everyone is giving their maximum to minimise the mistakes, and still it happens because we are humans at work.”

Reliability has repeatedly influenced Mercedes’ results this season. Wolff pointed towards Antonelli’s setback at Silverstone and the team’s previous retirements in Montreal and Barcelona as evidence of the points already lost through technical failures.

Wolff concluded: “That’s a little bit of the story of our season. It’s a technical sport, a mechanical sport. We came out with a product that is so strong, and I’d rather fix the reliability than try to accelerate a slow engine or a slow car. We need to give it 100% because we’ve lost a lot of points through reliability. We should be much further ahead than we are.”