Russell And Hamilton Dynamics Similar To Ricciardo And Vettel Suggests Villeneuve

Saturday, 16 December 2023 at 01:00

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George Russell has been a competitive teammate for Lewis Hamilton in Mercedes, and former F1 champion Jacques Villeneuve sees similarities with another duo.

After coming to Mercedes from Williams in 2022, there were no expectations put on the young Brit. On top of that, he was teamed up with a seven-time World Champion, and any result would have been a positive surprise.

And the youngster managed to deliver the surprise. In 2022, Russell outscored Hamilton (275 vs. 240), who was coming off a devastating World Championship loss to Red Bull's Max Verstappen in 2021.

According to former F1 champion Jacques Villeneuve, who spoke to PlanetF1, the dynamic between the two was quite similar to Daniel Ricciardo and Sebastian Vettel, who raced together in 2014.

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"Last year, Russell’s position was the same as Daniel Ricciardo’s when he got paired with [Sebastian] Vettel [at Red Bull in 2014]."

While the German driver was coming off four consecutive World Championship wins, Ricciardo joined the team from Toro Rosso, and no one had any expectations from the Australian.

And he delivered in the same way that Russell did, outscoring Vettel in his first season in Red Bull Racing. Looking at those two instances, Villeneuve identified the same reason behind the British driver's success in outscoring his older teammate.

"All he had to do was mind his business, not care about how good the team was – just beat Vettel, whereas Vettel was trying to reinvent the wheel to go and win races, which made him go slower. That made Ricciardo look good. That’s the same thing that happened between Russell and Hamilton last year."

Villeneuve claims certainly have some factual backing, as Hamilton easily beat Russell in the following season, while Ricciardo was outscored by Daniil Kvyat in the season after beating Vettel.