George Russell will take his fourth Mercedes power unit of the Formula 1 season for the Hungarian Grand Prix after a water leak brought his qualifying session to a premature halt.
Mercedes confirmed the British driver suffered a water leak at the end of Q3 after running over the exit kerb at Turn 4 during his final flying lap. The team discovered a crack on the engine that caused the loss of water pressure, forcing Russell to stop on track as he returned to the pits.
The power unit change does not incur a grid penalty, as Russell remains within the seasonal allocation of four engines. However, the 28-year-old now sits on the brink of a penalty — any further failure requiring a fifth internal combustion engine would trigger an automatic grid drop at the next occurrence.
Russell qualified seventh at the Hungaroring but will start Sunday's race from sixth place, elevated by the three-place grid penalty handed to his Mercedes team-mate Kimi Antonelli for failing to slow sufficiently under yellow flags in qualifying. Antonelli, the championship leader, qualified fourth but will start seventh.
"Fingers crossed it doesn't affect anything for the race," Russell told Sky Sports F1 after the session. "We lost water pressure and I had a water leak. When I stopped on track, the car was leaking a load of water."
The water leak is the latest in a string of reliability setbacks for Mercedes this season. Both Russell and Antonelli have lost valuable points through engine-related retirements. At the previous round in Belgium, a power unit software bug cost Russell straight-line speed and contributed to a race-ending collision with Lewis Hamilton at Spa-Francorchamps. Mercedes have since rectified that issue.
Russell trails Antonelli by 50 points in the drivers' championship. Mercedes technical director Simone Resta acknowledged the team's uneven performance distribution, noting that Antonelli had been running fresher power units in recent races, which will balance out as Russell now takes a newer unit.
"It's going to be difficult to overtake," Russell admitted. "It would have been nice to be higher up."
Sources
- https://www.skysports.com/f1/news/12433/13566876/hungarian-gp-george-russell-forced-to-change-mercedes-power-unit-after-water-leak-in-qualifying
- https://www.crash.net/f1/news/1101820/1/mercedes-reveals-issue-behind-george-russell-stoppage-hungary-f1-qualifying
