George Russell feels ready for a Formula 1 title fight but thinks Red Bull “are in a league of their own” ahead of the Bahrain Grand Prix.
The Briton enjoyed a strong first season at Mercedes in 2022, finishing ahead of teammate Lewis Hamilton and claiming his first victory at the penultimate race at Interlagos.
This year though, the aim is to put Mercedes back into contention for the championship, something Russell believes he can do.
“I definitely feel ready to fight for World Championships,” he told GPFans.com.
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“I don’t look back on any races [last year] with regret because ultimately, we did an incredibly good job just to be able to fight for these positions.
“The fact is victory was always a little bit out of sight because we just [didn’t] have the performance.”
After testing, however, Mercedes still appears to be off the pace heading into 2023, with Russell admitting victory is unlikely at this weekend’s season-opener.
“It probably wasn’t the smoothest three days we could have hoped for at testing,” he acknowledged. “But the learnings we found are going to put us in better stead for this weekend.
“I think it’s definitely fair to say Red Bull is in a league of their own this weekend, but it’ll probably be a nice fight for second between us, Ferrari and Aston Martin.”
Finding the right balance was Mercedes’ main issue during the test, with the team bringing a lower downforce rear wing for this weekend’s race to also improve top speed.
But even if the W14 starts on the back foot, Mercedes boss Toto Wolff is confident of progress.
“It’s always hard to have a clear picture of competitiveness at pre-season testing – and even more so with only three days of data available,” he commented.
“Our expectations were that we would likely be playing catch-up to the front, based on how last year ended. That seems to be the case so far but we will only know for sure after this weekend.
“Nevertheless, we are confident we have got a car we can work with and are in a stronger position than 12 months ago,” he added.
“More importantly, we are relishing the challenge. This championship will be fought over 23 race weekends, and each one will give us an opportunity to improve.”