25-year-old Formula 1 driver admits he’s missed a ‘huge amount’ of opportunities this year

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Mercedes driver George Russell has admitted that the 2023 Formula 1 season has been full of missed opportunities for him and the team.

Russell was speaking during his final pre-race press conference of the year on the eve of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix weekend beginning.

It’s been a frustrating campaign for George Russell and the Mercedes team.

Last year was spent attempting to chase down Ferrari and Red Bull with mixed success.

Russell recorded his first and so far, only Formula 1 win in Sao Paulo and strung together a series of podium finishes throughout the campaign.

However, 2023 has been a much more difficult season for Russell, as he’s only stood on the podium once this year in Barcelona.

Having beaten teammate Lewis Hamilton in the Drivers’ Championship last year, he’s some way off the seven-time world champion this time around.

Eddie Jordan commented in the build-up to this week’s Grand Prix that although he considers him to be a ‘world-class’ driver, he’s looked way off the pace of his fellow Mercedes driver.

Russell is unlikely to disagree but has lamented the difficult year he’s had and although he admits you make your own luck, plenty has gone wrong for him that’s out of his control.

Russell frustrated with the 2023 F1 season

Asked to draw his conclusions from this campaign, Russell said: “It’s been a very strange season. It’s been a season where we’ve had a lot of pace at times, but never achieved the results that we felt were deserved or were possible.

“So, definitely need to try and understand why that was. There’s been a huge amount of missed opportunities in many regards. It really hasn’t been a smooth season but I think when everything’s flowing, when everything’s working right, luck tends to be on your side.

“And when you’re on the back foot, you tend to have bad luck and I’m not one for believing in luck, I think you make your own luck so we just need to be faster and lady luck will be with us.”

In Las Vegas, a momentary lapse in concentration saw him collide with Max Verstappen as he made an ambitious move into turn 12.

He was given a five-second penalty – which Jenson Button disagreed with – but it undid all his hard work to finish fourth across the line after an exceptional recovery drive.

The pace he showed in 2022 is why Mercedes have decided to extend his contract until the end of 2025.

The likes of Frederic Vesti and Andrea Kimi Antonelli are highly rated by the team but are unlikely to feature in F1 for some time.

Russell is in no way at risk right now, but avoiding a repeat of the 2023 season will be at the top of his list of things to do when the paddock heads to Bahrain next March.