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Russell after bumpy Friday: “We still have a lot of work to do”

Bouncing Formula 1 cars flying at high speed through the tight streets of Monaco: it sounds like quite the challenge. George Russell says that within the team of Mercedes there is still much work to be done. He therefore wonders whether the gap to the competition can be closed this weekend.

Friday in Monaco has shown that the alleged porpoising has still not gone away. With the introduction of a set of new technical regulations and the return of ground effect, the teams are suffering from a phenomenon called porpoising: the car bouncing at high speed. The ground effect pushes Formula 1 cars to the ground, as it were. If the floor of the car comes too close to the asphalt, this ground effect is reduced. This causes the suspension to shoot up, after which the ground effect increases again. As a result, some cars start to bounce extremely at high speed.

Stiffness of the car

One suffers more from this than the other. Red Bull Racing in Ferrari seem to have largely solved it, for example, while Mercedes is still going up and down on certain circuits. When asked how difficult it is to drive these cars in Monaco, Russell says: “Very difficult, to be honest. The stiffness of these cars is very, very stiff. On a bumpy street circuit it is not easy to to drive on the limit.”

There’s work to be done

However, the young Briton is impressed with Ferrari: “We have seen them blossom again. We have seen how good they are on the curbs. In Imola they flew over it quite easily and at the moment that is clearly working in their favor.” There is still work to be done for Mercedes: “We still have a lot to do for tomorrow. I’m not sure if we can close the gap, but it’s always fun to drive here.” The Monaco Grand Prix starts on Sunday at 3 p.m.

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