Speaking in a print media session after Sunday’s 2025 F1 Japanese GP Race, Chief Communications Officer of the Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 Team, Bradley Lord, admitted that a less-than-ideal Saturday Qualifying session had denied the team their chance to fight for the podium.
Despite George Russell’s excellent performance in the first and third Free Practice sessions (FP1 and FP3), the British driver could not replicate his performance during Qualifying. He subsequently found himself starting Sunday’s race from the third row of the grid in P5. His rookie teammate, Kimi Antonelli, started alongside him in P6.
With limited overtaking opportunities during the race, the Mercedes duo ultimately finished where they started, despite Russell’s comparably better pace than Scuderia Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc in the final stint.
Cars looked “evenly matched” during Sunday’s Japanese GP race
While Lord thinks that it is difficult to properly assess Russell’s potential to challenge for the podium due to his limited time in clear air, he admitted that the 3-time race winner would have a better chance to fight for the podium had he started from the first or second row.
“It’s obviously difficult to say. George didn’t really have a sort of clear run at it, I suppose, in the race.
“But I think if we’d have been able to put the car where we felt the potential was, which was on those first two rows, quite where it might have been anywhere between first and fourth, then I’m sure we’d have raced there as well.”
While Lord stated that the team had also seen “really strong pace” from Antonelli who set the fastest lap, he admitted that, overall, many cars competing had seemed evenly matched, especially at the end of the race and despite tyre differences.
“So we saw a really strong pace from Kimi, albeit slightly offset on that hard tyre that was very competitive with the leaders.
“But equally, further back, we saw Sainz on 20-lap old softs, also still putting in sort of leader competitive times right at the end of the race as well. So it was one of those days where a lot of cars looked very evenly matched.”
Lack of overtaking opportunities affected the outcome of the race
Lord believes that the lack of overtaking opportunities around the Suzuka Circuit played the most significant role in determining the outcome of the F1 Japanese GP race. While he noted that the tyres had held on well throughout the race, he explained that the teams had been unable to capitalise on this as there had been few opportunities for overtaking.
“But as you say, you need a bigger overtaking halter around here than the tyres were providing. They held on really well and that meant everyone was able to push flat out for most of the race. But equally, it does sort of reduce the opportunities for variation and overtaking.”
“There’s only one change of position, I think, between the grid and the top ten results. So that tells the story,” he concluded.
Russell’s early pitstop a failed attempt to get past Leclerc
Lord also discussed Mercedes’ decision to pit Russell earlier than the drivers around him. He explained that the team had hoped that the 27-year-old would be able to get past Leclerc, but had ultimately failed to achieve this despite Russell successfully navigating the traffic that he had returned into on track.
“Yeah, we knew the traffic was there and sort of took that risk. We talked about it in the morning and George had sort of said, “‘I’m willing to box into some traffic because the tyre condition won’t enable us to make ground on them.’
“That was the case and he was able to get through, but it just wasn’t quite enough to be able to get past.
“So we had to try something. At that point, it looked like George was not really able to close down Leclerc either. So going long didn’t look like it would necessarily yield very much.”
He summarised, “Therefore, we decided to pull the trigger on the undercut and gave that a shot. It didn’t quite come off.”
