(Motorsport) The Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 team will feature a brand new partnership for the upcoming 2022 season with seven time World Champion Lewis Hamilton and 23 year old George Russell forming an all British team. Having been at loan to Williams for three years, Russell has already started his pre-season preparations for the season ahead and is raring to go, not just as Mercedes’ second driver but also to test himself against his teammate and the best in the world.

Hamilton hasn’t been defeated over a season since Nico Rosberg won the title in 2016. The 37 year old’s place on the Formula 1 grid is not yet confirmed as both Hamilton and Mercedes are currently waiting for FIA’s inquiry about the events that took place at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix and there has been gossip that the veteran could hang his boots after being disillusioned because of the manner he lost the championship. If he returns, it’s expected that Russell could provide a much bigger challenge for Hamilton than Valtteri Bottas who has been the second Mercedes driver since the last five seasons.

In an interview, George Russell said “Obviously I want to be a winner, I want to be a world champion and we spent the whole time at the back of the grid. 2020 was a stronger year but it wasn’t enough for us. 2021 was a stronger year but it was never enough. When I got into Q2 for the first time, we celebrated a lot. When you do that a second and a third time, that wears off, you want to get to Q3. When you are in Q3, we celebrated a lot and we were excited. But then you want to be in Q3 at every other event, or every event. Until you are world champion, it’s never enough.

“It wasn’t just the Mercedes experience, but there were other experiences as well, and dealing with and bouncing back from disappointment is part of life and part of competitive sport,” he added. You know a championship isn’t won or lost in one race, it’s won over the course of a season. You will always have disappointing race weekends, you’ll have failures, you’ll have success. But if you don’t bounce back from those disappointments, you are only going to compromise yourself and your team for the remaining races. So accepting those disappointments, learning from it, and equally just moving on and going from there.”

At just 23 years of age, Russell not only has the hunger and desire to make his mark as a future F1 champion but now also has the tools at his disposal to make it a reality. Mercedes have been closely tracking his progress at Williams and the Silver Arrows undoubtedly will hope that Russell can prove to be the long term solution to maintain Mercedes’ dominance in Formula 1 when Hamilton eventually retires. As of now, it would serve Russell to learn from one of the greatest drivers the sport has ever seen and soak in the experience while adding his own capabilities into the mix. It’s going to be an interesting season ahead.

The 2022 campaign will begin on 18-20th March and will feature 23 races.

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