As the Bahrain Grand Prix unfolded and George Russell raced in second place, messages slowly came through on his radio that different systems were failing. Team principal Toto Wolff put it simply: “The car was wounded.”
The Mercedes driver suddenly suffered a brake-by-wire failure, and it took time to find the settings to reset the system, Wolff said. He lost the GPS, and he experienced onboard Drag Reduction System (DRS) issues, which led to his race engineer having to tell him over the radio when he could use the system.
The fear arose that the Briton “would lose the whole dash — which would have meant no buttons, no way to turn any of the settings,” Wolff added. All while navigating the final stint on the soft tire for over 20 laps and keeping a surging Lando Norris behind him, not once losing his concentration. But Russell pulled off the feat.
Sunday’s race might have been Russell’s greatest Formula One drive to date, a performance that Wolff described as “an unbelievable drive” to reporters. And while he did face an investigation after the race for an alleged DRS infringement, the stewards found he gained no sporting advantage, meaning Russell kept his second-place finish — a crucial points haul in a season where Mercedes doesn’t expect to be in contention for the championships.
But each millisecond, each point gain, matters when the margins are this thin throughout the grid. As Wolff said to Sky Sports, “I think it’s the driver who saved the result today.”
What happened to Russell’s car?
Russell admitted during the post-race news conference that he was pleased to see the chequered flag. The Briton had essentially driven in the dark (no pun intended, considering the Bahrain GP is a night race).
The Mercedes driver overcame the initial setback of the one-place grid drop from qualifying and passed Charles Leclerc at the start, holding onto second throughout the race. It didn’t come into question until the final stages as Norris navigated around the Ferraris and started closing the gap to Russell, all while Russell experienced a multitude of issues in his car.
All may have seemed well externally, but internally, a series of failures unfolded.
“It felt all under control for a moment, and then suddenly we had a brake-by-wire failure. So suddenly the pedal was going long, and then it was going short,” Russell explained, meaning he needed to push the pedal further or shorter than normal to get braking action.
“I didn’t know what was going on. The steering wheel wasn’t working properly, so it was really hard fought to keep Lando behind. I think one more lap, he would have got me pretty comfortably.”
A brake-by-wire failure essentially is when the electronic system that controls the rear brakes fails. When that malfunctions, the brakes are done manually by the driver rather than going through a system, which can make it harder to control the car under braking. Wolff likened it to when the power steering system fails in a road car, and to “imagine you have to adjust between one corner having it and the next one not having it.”
“That was just very good skill,” he said.
Well said, Boss 😤 The best things in life are never easy! ✊ pic.twitter.com/adOVTbK0H1
— Mercedes-AMG PETRONAS F1 Team (@MercedesAMGF1) April 13, 2025
Then there was the GPS issue. Russell suddenly disappeared from the timing screens soon after the safety car period, a clear sign that something was wrong. His transponder stopped working, and not having that GPS data affected how he could use DRS. Without the data, it became harder to judge the gaps — not just from his side in comparison to other cars, but also for those around him, like Norris.
According to Wolff, the DRS beacon failed, which meant Russell needed to open the system manually. He tried “an override on the DRS,” Russell said, adding, “On one lap, I clicked the radio button and the DRS opened, so I straightaway closed it again, backed off — nothing gained.
“I lost more than I gained, it was only open for a split second, so kind of goes to show you the amount of issues we were having.”
The stewards did investigate the alleged DRS infringement, and they stated, “The connection between the automated DRS activation system and the car failed due to issues with a timing loop provided by an external party.” Manual activation was authorized.
“At the time, the driver was experiencing a brake-by-wire issue and other electronic issues,” said the stewards. “He was at that time advised to use an auxiliary button in the cockpit which serves as a backup radio button but also serves as a manual DRS activation button.”
The stewards confirmed what Russell had shared — that when he tried to use the team radio, DRS was “accidentally activated” when navigating one of the straights. According to the stewards, the telemetry confirmed the following: “The DRS was activated for a distance of 37 metres on a straight of approximately 700 metres. Whilst he gained 0.02 seconds, he gave up 0.28 seconds at the next corner to compensate.”
To be clear, that is a breach of the sporting regulations; however, no sporting advantage was gained so no penalty was handed to Russell or Mercedes.
All of this happened while finishing out the race and holding off a McLaren, arguably the fastest car on the grid so far this season, while on soft tires. Russell shared to Sky Sports how he didn’t have data on his steering wheel during the final stint, making it a compromised run.
“I’m not too sure how that one worked as well,” Russell said. “I saw Charles behind me on the hard and I saw 24 laps to go. I thought, ‘Jeez, how the hell are we going to make this work?’ But we did.”
Russell may have been able to pull this drive off, putting him within six points of Max Verstappen in the driver standings, but why these issues arose was unknown to Mercedes immediately post-race.
“We don’t know, probably some wiring looms in the car or anything else,” Wolff said. “Maybe it was triggered by the failure in the F1 system, and then it caused our system to go a bit bananas.”
Russell limped home with a second-place finish (Mark Thompson/Getty Images)
What does the result mean for Mercedes’ season?
McLaren may be dominating this season, with Oscar Piastri pocketing a second win and Norris having one of his own, but Mercedes has been consistently at the front, with Russell sometimes being the closest challenger, like on Sunday.
Across four races — all different types of tracks — Russell has secured three podium finishes, bringing home third in Australia and China. That type of performance is enough to build confidence within a team, particularly after the difficult stretch Mercedes has experienced with trying to find consistency in the current regulations.
“This was the real sort of test for us. We knew that our car likes the cold conditions, and the competitiveness we showed in China and Suzuka was no major surprise,” Russell said. “But this was going to be the question mark — here in Bahrain. And we’ve had another strong weekend. So it bodes well for the season.”
The Briton said Mercedes didn’t anticipate being close to McLaren in Bahrain, at a track where many expected the Woking-based team would thrive. But then Russell qualified second and teammate Kimi Antonelli fourth, before the one-place grid drops, and Russell said, “Qualifying on the front row was a real surprise.
“And then seeing Lando right up there on lap one behind me, I thought, ‘He’s going to fly off into the distance here.’ Oscar did an amazing job to control the race, but to keep Lando at bay, I was really, really pleased about.”
Mercedes sits 58 points off McLaren in the constructor standings, thanks to Russell’s podium finish. When asked if McLaren was catchable, Wolff shared that he felt the team was missing “a few tenths” on Sunday and wanted to see how future tracks unfolded. He pointed toward how the tide turned last season, with McLaren having a big momentum swing several races after finishing sixth and eighth in Bahrain.
But when Russell was asked if the Silver Arrows were title contenders, he cautioned against the suggestion.
“I’d love to say so, but I don’t think we are, to be honest. McLaren are just too dominant right now. I think this is probably going to be their peak performance — what we saw this week in Bahrain,” the 27-year-old explained. “And what we saw in China and Suzuka is probably their worst-case scenario and they still obviously got one victory from those two races.”
Russell added about the importance of capitalizing on moments and picking up points when possible, like they did in Australia and Bahrain.
When the battles are this close, being in the right place at the right time is crucial. We’ve seen that with Mercedes, as well as the battles in the midfield, so far this season.
“I don’t expect this to continue for many races to come,” Russell said, “but who knows.”
Additional reporting: Luke Smith
(Top photo: Clive Rose/Getty Images)
Source: nytimes.com
