Mercedes report a difficult Friday in Malaysia as Russell targets pole despite upgrade woes

By Vancouver Television Sports Desk

Mercedes’ weekend started with a setback in Malaysia after the team brought a new package of upgrades to its car, only to find that Friday’s running did not go to plan in either practice session. While the upgrades have changes to the floor edge, sidepods and rear diffuser, Mercedes still struggled to match the pace of the front-running competition as the day progressed.

In FP1, George Russell produced a promising result by finishing second, but he remained nearly four-tenths of a second behind Max Verstappen’s benchmark. The team’s second driver, Kimi Antonelli, was less competitive in the second session, where both Mercedes cars ultimately found the limits of their performance window.

By FP2, Russell and Antonelli faded down the order amid mistakes during their flying-lap attempts. Russell ended the session seventh and Antonelli eighth after issues on their timed laps proved costly, including incidents that affected their ability to complete clean runs and comply with track limits.

Russell’s comments framed the challenge as both competitive and technical. He acknowledged Verstappen’s speed, while also pointing to McLaren’s strong race pace as a key threat, but said he would not rule himself out of the pole fight. “Currently, I think that Verstappen looks very fast, and then the race pace of McLaren looked very quick, but never say never,” Russell said.

Russell also described the circuit as an “iconic” venue after driving it for the first time, but he made clear that tyre behaviour and the changing operating window were central to Mercedes’ problems. “With these conditions, tyre [degradation] is huge for everybody,” he said, adding that the car was “a bit off the pace” and that Mercedes needed to make set-up changes rather than assume the upgrades alone were the solution.

The details of Friday’s on-track running suggested why Mercedes needed more work overnight. Russell initially ran the medium tyres in FP2 and switched to the softs for a single flying lap, but he went wide out of the final corner and missed cutting inside the bollard, forcing him to abort and run through the pit lane instead. Antonelli similarly went wide on the soft tyre and lost time due to track limits, which contributed to both drivers being slightly out of position in the top 10.

Russell said it was difficult to isolate the impact of the new upgrade package because tyre overheating and degradation appeared to dominate the day. He told the team he could feel extra downforce in some corners, but added that “with this amount of tyre overheating and tyre degradation, that kind of trumps everything.” His conclusion was that Mercedes needed to get on top of the issue overnight, describing it as “more of a set-up rather than the upgrade itself.”

Deputy Team Principal Bradley Lord characterized Friday as among the toughest of the season so far and linked Mercedes’ situation to broader competitive patterns seen during the day. “It’s probably been one of our toughest Fridays of the season so far,” Lord said, explaining that the competitive picture looked more like earlier-season comparisons, rather than the advantage Mercedes had shown in the previous weekend’s results.

Lord also confirmed the team received constructive feedback about the direction of the upgrades, with drivers feeling more downforce in high-speed corners. However, he stressed that Mercedes could not revert to a previous configuration for the remainder of the weekend, meaning it would have to extract the maximum from what it has. “There’ll be lots of work this evening to trawl through the data,” Lord said, adding that Mercedes had to ensure it was running the car “where it’s now at its happiest.”

He pointed to Verstappen as the standout over the long runs in both FP1 and FP2 on different tyre compounds, while indicating that the battle close behind was tight. “It looks like a very, very close-fought thing just behind him,” Lord said, concluding that Mercedes was “right in that mix” and could take a step forward with improvements.

With qualifying and the race still to come, Mercedes’ immediate priority is clear: recover the car’s set-up and manage tyre degradation to better convert its new aerodynamic changes into performance. Russell’s insistence that “never say never” remains part of the pole discussion reflects that, despite Friday’s struggles, Mercedes believes it can still close the gap if it finds the right adjustments overnight.