Speaking after qualifying, George Russell, when asked about his opinion on how the team has been performing this past weekend and expectations for tomorrow's race.

Russell comments, "We're not really here battling for P5 or P6 as a team; it was a very difficult day." 

He adds, "The car was on a nice edge in a really nice window it's so difficult, Lewis and I were going down a different set of routes and clearly it didn't work out. It's clear in the data so as a team it's a bit of a shame from my personal perference I would've been pleased with P5 but it was possible if I pieced everything together."

The Mercedes driver continues, "That's just where we are at the moment. It's tricky that we put in all of our effort and it's not allowing us to focus on the driving as much, tyre groove, fine tuning of the balance and the setting of the time." 

He concludes his statement with, "All of our time being used up to solve this issue."

When Russell was later asked about the weight of the car and the limitations, Russell responds, "Limitations are the same as we've seen since day one." 

He adds, "The only way to run is to race the car very high and with the effects of the ground, we lose all of our downforce. We know that if we get the car off the ground we're taking away a huge chunk of our lap time and we can't achieve that at the moment. So, it's all well in good saying that but we can't achieve that right now."

Shifting gears, one questioned his opinion on what happened on Friday despite a lot of things happening off the track and if he's happy to race this weekend especially after participating in the drivers meeting between practice sessions. 

The Brit answers, "Clarity was needed, the conversation was needed it's good standing united and together with Formula One and ultimately we trust in Stefano [CEO of F1] as a whole and we woudln't be here if it wasn't right to be here. Obviously, needed a lot of clarity after this weekend where we go from here. From my understanding things are under control, so, nothing to say really." 

He concludes, "I think it’s the right decision to race, I don’t have all the answers, I’m not an expert in military defence or whatever. But, we have to trust people around and we wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t safe so that gives us confidence we have to trust people around us. I trust Formula One and Stefano."