It ruined the Finn’s race, with old, cold, hard tyres now giving him no grip. It meant they then had to be taken off and the old hard tyres re-fitted again. As Russell left the pits, the mechanics then fitted mediums to Bottas’ car before realising their error. The pit crew seemed alarmingly unprepared and, in the confusion, the front two medium tyres bolted on to Russell’s car were meant for Bottas. With Russell still leading Bottas, it was a late call to bring them both into the pits. Ironically, it was Russell’s own stand-in replacement at Williams Racing, Jack Aitken, who got it wrong out of the final corner, clipping the barrier and losing his front wing.Ī picture paints a thousand words #SakhirGP 🇧🇭 #F1 /oJlCTldCAXĪt first, a Virtual Safety Car was signalled, and several cars dived into the pits to switch from hard to medium tyres, as is the norm in such a situation. And that, sadly, is exactly what happened. Unless things went badly wrong, of course. Bottas had no answers to his pace, and there seemed nothing that could possibly prevent a fairy-tale victory for the popular driver.Įven a Safety Car situation, bunching up the field, would not have bothered Russell in this form, on this day. He was driving like a seasoned champion, having only learned days earlier that he would be filling in for the COVID-afflicted Lewis Hamilton. After 61 laps of racing in the Sakhir Grand Prix, it was all going so swimmingly well for Mercedes debutant George Russell, the Englishman having overtaken established teammate Valtteri Bottas off the line whilst maintaining a comfortable gap.
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