George Russell’s dwindling championship hopes have been dealt a further blow as he is set to start this week’s Singapore Grand Prix from the rear of the grid.
Russell’s heartbreaking power-unit failure in the closing stages of Sunday’s Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia left him a whopping 84 points adrift of team-mate Kimi Antonelli with just seven rounds left to run.
The British driver conceded that hopes of a maiden title are now “exceptionally unlikely”.
And his slender chances of a turnaround have been dealt another setback. It is understood that the 28-year-old will need to take a new power unit this weekend.
That will take Russell over the limit on several components and the penalties are likely to leave him starting from the rear of the grid around the streets of Singapore.
Antonelli won the Italian Grand Prix last month having taken a similar penalty and Russell will need something similarly miraculous.
Singapore is a Sprint weekend so Russell will only have to start at the back of the grid for the Grand Prix and not Saturday’s Sprint.
Speaking after the mishap in Malaysia, Mercedes deputy team principal Bradley Lord says his outfit are unsure what caused their latest issue with Russell.
"Our investigation so far, we've got the car back, we've been able to do a first inspection, it's clearly a mechanical failure on the power unit side," he said in Mercedes' race debrief video.
"Exactly what the root cause is we still need to determine, but the consequence was clear for all to see."
PA
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