“I was surprised to see him pit”

George Russell led for much of the Italian Grand Prix but had to settle for second after Kimi Antonelli passed him late on. The Briton admitted his team mate’s pit stop under the Virtual Safety Car — triggered by Lance Stroll’s stopped Aston Martin — “surprised” him.

“To be honest I thought we were both going to stay out. I was surprised to see him pit,” Russell said. “I think at the end it was a roll of the dice both ways. In the moment, the team wouldn’t have known which strategy was better. It made sense to split the cars but, in the end, Kimi had great pace, and there we are.”

A lost opportunity

Russell had started second and controlled the race, fending off Max Verstappen, before Antonelli arrived. “Huge congratulations to Kimi of course — an incredible result from him,” Russell said. “When I looked on the leaderboard at the beginning and I saw he was already in P5, P4, I knew straight away he was going to be in the mix. Huge congrats to him.”

The result extends Antonelli’s title lead to 66 points with 10 races remaining, and Russell must still serve his own engine-penalty grid drop. “I’m not even thinking about a fight or a comeback or anything,” Russell said. “I’m just focused on taking it race by race... He’s performing incredibly well. It’s going to be exceptionally challenging to overcome that gap, so I’m just sort of accepting that it is what it is and I’m just going to enjoy it from here on in.”

Toto Wolff confirmed the split strategies were about covering threats: “We didn’t know what was the better strategy. At that stage, the system said that the one-stop comes out ahead. That two-stop was coming close to the end, but wouldn’t catch.” Russell, who started the year as title favourite, now accepts his role: “He’s deserving to be in control of it.”