George Russell hints at Ferrari disqualification risk after Charles Leclerc issues at Hungarian GP

George Russell has discussed Charles Leclerc’s severe drop in pace during the Hungarian Grand Prix, explaining that he could have been running the car too low and risked a disqualification for excessive plank wear.

Leclerc started the race at the Hungaroring from pole position and had a strong first stint. He retained his lead at the start and kept a strong pace until pitting from the lead on the 41st lap. After that point, the Monegasque driver complained over the team radio, stating that he had “lost all competitiveness.”

“This is so incredibly frustrating. We have lost all competitiveness, you just have to listen to me,” he said to his race engineer Bryan Bozzi. “I would have found a different way of managing those issues. Now it’s just undriveable. It’s a miracle if we finish on the podium.”

Although the reason for his drop in performance has not been explained by Ferrari, Russell, who finished the race in third ahead of Leclerc in fourth, gave his verdict on the situation while speaking to Sky Sports F1.

“Well, I saw how slow he was, so I presumed something was not right,” the Briton explained.

“The only thing we can think of is they were running the car too low to the ground, and they had to increase the tyre pressures for the last stint because they were using an engine mode that was making the engine slower at the end of the straight, which is where you have the most amount of plank wear.”

George Russell, Mercedes

Photo by: Guido De Bortoli / LAT Images via Getty Images

When told that Leclerc had said that it was related to the chassis, Russell added: “He’s not going to tell you that they’re close to being illegal. That’s the only thing we can think of based upon the lap times and the engine mode they were running and stuff like that, but nevertheless, really pleased with the result. 

“Strange weekend when you look at it, if you exclude McLaren and you look at the order of sort of P3 to P13, it’s quite odd. You wouldn’t expect Max to be so far down. Aston had an amazing weekend, so we’ll take the positives. We won’t get carried away with them.”

Photos from Hungarian GP – Race