George Russell Is Running a Perfect Season — and a Furious Row With Ferrari Is Brewing

George Russell is now two for two in the 2026 season, with Saturday’s Chinese Grand Prix sprint win following his victory in Melbourne a week earlier.



The race itself delivered everything the new regulations had promised: genuine drama, lead changes, and unpredictable power unit behaviour off the line.



Russell started on pole and initially held his advantage. Then Lewis Hamilton happened.



The seven-time champion surged from fourth on the grid, passed Lando Norris into Turn 1, and took the lead with an audacious dive at Turn 9.



What followed was one of the most entertaining opening sequences the sprint format has produced. Russell and Hamilton exchanged the lead six times across the opening five laps.



Russell finally broke clear on lap five and never looked back, eventually taking the flag 0.6 seconds ahead of Charles Leclerc, with Hamilton third.



The result extends Russell’s championship lead to 11 points over Kimi Antonelli, with Mercedes having dominated every session across both race weekends so far.



Ralf Schumacher, speaking on Sky Sports Germany, offered a word of caution to anyone treating the title as settled. “I believe that Mercedes still has a few reserves left,” he said.



“McLaren has also taken a step forward, so it looks like things could become more exciting,” Schumacher added, “and it will likely get even closer from here on, because development will really start to ramp up now.”



Away from the racing, Russell opened a pointed dispute with Ferrari over the chaos at race starts. A harvest limit quirk is causing massive speed differentials on the grid — and nearly causing accidents.



“The FIA could make changes,” Russell said, “I think they want to but they need a super majority from the teams which they don’t have.”



“So you can probably guess which team is against that,” he continued. “I don’t think their gain is coming from this issue.”



Russell stopped short of naming Ferrari directly. He did not need to. Their superior launch performance this season is the only obvious beneficiary of the current rules.



Toto Wolff, watching his team’s second dominant weekend unfold, was characteristically pointed about those who had doubted Antonelli’s readiness for F1. “Many said the kid was too young to be in a Mercedes,” he said. “He did good today.”
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