Hamilton snubbed as ex-champ proposes dark horse to rival Verstappen

Lewis Hamilton reveals the Queen told him off at the Royal lunch

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Former F1 world champion Mario Andretti has tipped George Russell to take the fight to Max Verstappen in 2023, providing Mercedes put together a competitive car. The former Williams star has fared well against seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton, whose hopes of landing number eight may be slipping away. 

The fact that F1 fans are already theorising about who could challenge Verstappen in 2023 says plenty about how this season has gone. With four Grands Prix remaining, the Red Bull ace can’t be caught after yet another victory in Japan on Sunday. 

That sealed back-to-back Drivers’ Championships for the 25-year-old, who went to war with Hamilton last year and came out on top. Despite their timeless battle in 2021, Andretti, who won the title in 1978, believes that Russell could be a more game challenger. 

When asked about who could rival Verstappen next year, he told Any Driven Monday: “You never know about next season, there’s always something to look forward to. The revelation for this season, for me, has been George Russell.

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“Just looking at his performances, taking over immediately and it’s not only qualifying speed but also race craft. In the beginning I thought, ‘look out, he might just be the dark horse this season’. It’s great to see someone that, at first, you wouldn’t have felt that he was going to be right on, but to measure up against Lewis Hamilton is huge.”

Russell was something of an unknown quantity when he stepped up to replace Valtteri Bottas at the start of the season. His three-year spell at Williams told fans little about how he would cope in a Championship-chasing car. 

Although Mercedes have failed to provide one of those in 2022, Russell has still acquitted himself well and currently enjoys a 27-point buffer over the vastly more experienced Hamilton. And he’s not afraid to demand more from his team, either, lambasting them for a pit-lane mishap that saw him tumble down the pecking order at Suzuka. 

The Silver Arrows decided to double stack which forced Russell to wait for Hamilton, who eventually finished fifth, three ahead of his younger team-mate in P8. Sat 46 points behind Charles Leclerc, it is still conceivable that the 24-year-old could fight his way up to second in the Drivers’ Championship. 

“The grip was fine but the problem was we couldn’t see anything,” said the Brit in Japan. “The spray was so bad. You didn’t know where the drivers were, you didn’t know where the puddles were, where the rivers were. So it was literally just the visibility.

“I don’t know whether with these new cars, they bring up more spray. Obviously, there’s been so many more improvements with the racing, perhaps this is one of the downsides, who knows? But for sure the rivers here in Suzuka Circuit need to be improved because they’re the exact same as they have been for about four or five years now in the same spots.”

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