Jost Capito took charge of the Williams F1 team after the Williams family gave up the ownership of the outfit last year. This has enabled him to look at every team member with a fresh perspective. He has noticed a lot of similarities between George Russell and Kimi Raikkonen.
The 23-year-old is one of the most talented youngsters on the grid. He has managed to take his Williams car to its maximum potential and pushed it into Q2 during several qualifying sessions.
The Emilia Romagna Grand Prix saw Russell start in 12th position. But, he managed to work his way up to P9 before he had an unfortunate crash with Mercedes driver Valtteri Bottas which eliminated both drivers from the race.
In an interview, the Williams CEO mentioned the similarities between Russell and Raikkonen.
“There is a lot, in George I see a lot what I seen in Kimi. His driving brilliant, his natural talent is brilliant. But he doesn’t rely just on his natural talent. He is working very hard and he is demanding,” he said.
“Where I said before, it’s not easy to work with him. I said no, I meant that as a compliment. Because he is demanding, he wants more and more, he is never happy and a driver should never be happy with what he has.
“But he has the ability to get the team behind him. Everybody is really pushing and motivated to give him what he is demanding. And that is an ability that a top driver needs.”
Russell would want to learn from his mistake in Imola and redeem himself at the next race. He is hopeful he will be able to accrue points for the Grove-based outfit in the upcoming race in Portugal.
Do you think Russell has it in him to move to the top of the grid? Let us know in the comments below!
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