George Russell said he felt so ill this weekend he couldn’t have raced on a more demanding track than Baku.
The Mercedes driver admitted he came close to pulling out of the event earlier in the weekend but decided he could cope with a race around Baku. The track includes several long straights which give drivers an opportunity to recover and few demanding high-speed corners.
Russell finished today’s race in second place but admitted he was relieved to see the chequered flag.
“Fortunately it was Baku,” he said after the race. “Even though it’s one of the toughest circuits, mentally and physically it’s maybe one of the easiest.
“Today I’m much better. On Friday and Saturday, I was really rough. Had it been Singapore, as an example, I think I probably would have called it a day on Friday, to be honest, and probably wouldn’t have done the race.
“So it’s sort of fortunate timing. I haven’t been ill for a couple of years, actually, so it just all sort of hit me at once over these days, but I’m on the up now.”
Russell scored his best result since his victory in the Canadian Grand Prix in June. He credited the result to “just staying out of trouble” in a weekend where several others hit trouble.
“I don’t think we had a spectacular weekend, to be honest. Obviously Carlos [Sainz Jnr] just did an amazing job, and Liam [Lawson] also did a great job yesterday qualifying ahead of us.
“But all of the cars who we ordinarily fight sort of made mistakes or underperformed, and we sort of picked up the pieces.
“So obviously I’m really happy to finish [second] all things considered. Also, I think the cool temps helped us a little bit. So it’s just good to capitalise on all of those things.”
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