Mercedes technical director James Allison spoke kindly about the team’s drivers – Lewis Hamilton and George Russell. Appearing on the Performance People podcast, Allison praised the British pairing as one of the strongest on the F1 grid. The 55-year-old, as quoted by F1 Maximaal, cited it as the ideal combo of experience and young talent.
Allison said, “And we have a driver duo that I think all teams would look at with envy. We have in one of our drivers perhaps the most successful person to ever sit behind the wheel of a race car. “And in the other, a very promising young man: George.”
The Briton thinks that the Silver Arrows are fortunate to have this line-up. He added, “We are a very fortunate team. We have to use that luck next year and hopefully achieve a place better than P2”.
This may sound like Mercedes beating its own drum because the champion, Max Verstappen, differs from Allison’s opinion. The Dutchman feels that the McLaren duo is one of the strongest driver pairings of the current grid.
As per racer.com, Verstappen had praised Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri for consistently challenging him in the latter half of 2023. He said, “I do think that as a team, they are probably the most consistent compared to the others behind us. And I do think they have the best driver line-up out of all of them.”
The three-time champion feels McLaren has the chance among the teams to chase Red Bull and challenge them in 2024. He is also keen to see where everyone will be at the start of next season. About the Mercedes duo, Verstappen is not the only voice claiming otherwise in the best driver duo debate.
Nico Rosberg analyzes the driver dynamic problems at Mercedes
Few people know the internal situation at Mercedes like Nico Rosberg. He had the infamous rivalry with Lewis Hamilton and knows exactly how it feels to have tensions on the team. Rosberg gave his insights on how Russell and Hamilton also experienced these dynamic issues and thus contrasts the best driver duo claims.
The 2016 champion acknowledged how it is pressurizing for someone new like Russell to come into the team and handle these things. Therefore, incidents in Japan and Qatar that highlighted tensions between Mercedes drivers this year occurred.
The Japanese GP saw a strategy difference between the two British drivers, and Russell complained about Hamilton not helping him out during the race. This further escalated in Qatar when the duo collided on Lap 1 of the Grand Prix. This caused Hamilton to retire as he beached his car in the gravel.
Qatar was a race for which Toto Wolff was absent. Thus, Rosberg cited the need for Wolff to handle the tense situation after the Qatar collision. He said, “I hope that Toto [Wolff] is managing that carefully. Is he going to be ahead of the curve and not let things spiral?”
The German driver mentioned that Russell could not be the nice guy and sat back to give Hamilton the lead in the team. He needs to keep the pressure up so it pushes the duo to perform better. While Mercedes have secured P2 in 2023, if they have to do better in 2024 and have the best driver duo, incidents like Qatar and Japan need to be avoided.
