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<\/p>\nMercedes driver George Russell has joined Lewis Hamilton in lamenting the Silver Arrows’ car after a disappointing qualifying session ahead of Sunday’s Japanese Grand Prix. Russell qualified in eighth, one place behind his team-mate, as he admitted that it was no surprise because of the car he has been provided.<\/p>\n
“It’s a fair representation of how we are on circuits like this,” Russell told Sky Sports F1. “When there’s a big contrast of corners – high-speed and low-speed corners, we struggle to cover all aspects.<\/p>\n
“Whereas on circuits where it’s one type of corner, like we saw last week in Singapore, we can nail the sweet spot of the car and maximise the downforce. No big surprise but obviously a bit of a shock to the system. But when you think about it rationally, it’s about where you would expect.”<\/p>\n
His comments came after Hamilton had already voiced his frustrations with the path that Mercedes have taken this season, having already criticised the W14 this season.<\/p>\n
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“Yesterday was a bad day,” Hamilton admitted as he doubled down on his previous request to be heard during the development of next year’s car. “Each weekend we are having, out of the three days there is at least one bad day.<\/p>\n
“Then in qualifying I was giving it everything but that seven tenths deficit we have in sector one, it’s all rear end. Our car has loads of load on the front and not as much as we need on the rear.<\/p>\n
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“So we’re a really long way down on that and for me it’s 100 per cent clear that’s concept and we have got to make sure we change that for next year, which hopefully we will. I gave it everything I could, I was happy with my laps, they were just not that quick compared to others.”<\/p>\n