Photo via BBC Sport

Russell to take further grid penalty this season

Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes teammate George Russell will face another grid penalty at the Singapore Grand Prix after being forced to use an older engine specification due to repeated failures this season. The team’s decision follows a disappointing weekend in Malaysia, where Russell’s retirement and teammate Valtteri Bottas’s second-place finish left Mercedes trailing Red Bull in the constructors’ championship.

With no spare engines available, Russell accepted the penalty to avoid further performance degradation over the remaining seven races, while also reverting to the car specification he used to win in Azerbaijan. Meanwhile, teammate Valtteri Bottas will continue with the new aerodynamic upgrade introduced in Malaysia, which failed to deliver the expected performance boost, prompting Mercedes to split their car specs for further testing.

Russell’s season has been marked by reliability issues, including a drive-through penalty in Monaco and a major engine failure in Canada, compounding a lackluster performance that has kept him out of podium contention this year.

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