George Russell: The car doesn't have enough speed on Soft

      George Russell and Kimi Antonelli clocked tenth and sixteenth time in the second session of the free races of the Australian Grand Prix. Both Mercedes drivers said that the car does not have enough speed on Soft tires, but they are competitive on tougher compounds.

      George Russell (10th): "It wasn't an easy day. Every time we put Medium or Hard tires on the car, I was in first or second place on the scoresheet, and the car handled well on every lap. But after switching to Soft, we didn't start going much faster. Obviously, the car is a little slow due to the fact that it is not possible to get the most out of the soft tires. The team needs to understand what this is about.

      Let's see what we can do tonight before tomorrow. If we had to use only Hard or Medium, we would definitely be among the leaders, but it is obvious that it is impossible to qualify on these compounds, and we need to use Soft tires, on which we are not fast enough. But I'm sure we'll find a solution tonight."

      Kimi Antonelli (16th): "The day turned out to be quite positive. We still have to work on the speed on a fast lap to get the tires into range, but overall, it's pretty good.

      I made a mistake at the end of the session, but today I felt more confident in the car with every lap. The long series of laps went quite well."