George Russell has revealed points appeared possible at one point during a strong Monaco Grand Prix on Sunday.
In a race dictated by tyres, the Briton was actually the fastest car on track for three laps after his pit-stop and would capitalise on contact between Antonio Giovinazzi and Robert Kubica to move up the order.
Eventually settling for 15th place, beating Stroll, Raikkonen, Kubica and Giovinazzi on track, the F2 champion wanted more from his first F1 race in Monte Carlo.
“I think the early stop worked out really well for us,” Russell stated afterwards.
“It could have gone even better though, I think one of the guys was bunching everyone else up in the pack and holding everyone up. There was one point where we thought I was going to end up ahead of Carlos Sainz in P6!”
“From my side, I was very happy with the race. We weren’t really fighting for anything in the second half but I wanted to treat it like we were.
“I have to test myself and put it on the limit so when the time comes, I’ll know what to expect. Our times out there were pretty decent.”
Russell’s P15 also matched his best result so far this season, but he didn’t believe he “overperformed” the potential of his troubled Williams car.
“We maximised the job and it was great to get so many laps under my belt pushing the limits,” the 20-year-old said.
“At one point, my engineer got on the radio and said I was lapping the same pace of the leader! I was like: ‘What’s going on here?!’ I assume they had an issue or something but I was really happy with that.”