‘A little bit of a surprise’ – George Russell and Mercedes wary of McLaren threat after Friday practice ahead of 2026 Formula 1 Japanese Grand Prix

George Russell admits that the pace of McLaren during Friday practice for the Japanese Grand Prix was “a little bit of a surprise”.

The Mercedes driver enters the third round of the season leading the Drivers’ Championship, having won the season-opener in Australia and the China Sprint before finishing second behind team mate Kimi Antonelli in the Chinese Grand Prix.

The German manufacturer has dominated proceedings so far under the new-for-2026 regulations and although Russell led a Mercedes 1-2 in Free Practice 1, the pair were unable to match the pace of McLaren’s Oscar Piastri in the second one-hour session in Japan.

“McLaren were pretty fast so [that was] a little bit of a surprise to be honest,” said Russell, who was two-tenths slower than Piastri in FP2. “There’s still some improvements we need to do so a bit of work to do tonight.”

The reigning Teams’ champions, McLaren suffered a disasterous double DNS in China when neither Piastri nor Drivers’ World Champion Lando Norris were able to make the start after problems with their Mercedes power units.

Norris also suffered problems in Japan, as a suspected hydraulic leak meant he missed half of the FP2 session, but the Briton still finished only half a second behind Piastri.

When asked if he thought McLaren’s pace was genuine, Russell suggested there was more that Mercedes need to do in order to continue its winning start to the campaign.

“I don’t see why it wouldn’t be genuine to be honest. I think Lando’s had a disruptive day but Oscar has been pretty on it from the first lap out of the box this morning,” said Russell.

“We’ll find out come Qualifying. I think we’ve got some more to give and things weren’t quite optimised, especially on my side with the energy management, so hopefully a little bit more to come tomorrow.

“I think there’s some quite big differences in the deployment between teams and what’s been optimised over the course of the lap. I think we didn’t quite have that right and it should be a relatively easy fix.”