George Russell insists this year's Formula 1 season "won't break me" as Kimi Antonelli is set to become world champion this weekend in Mexico. A top nine finish for Antonelli, or Russell or Lewis Hamilton failing to win Sunday's Mexico City Grand Prix, would secure the title for the Italian, who would be the youngest champion in F1 history at 20 years old. Russell came into 2026 as favourite after dominating Antonelli last year but has won just three races to his team-mate's nine, regularly being outperformed throughout the season.
"I've probably learned more about myself this year than I would have liked to in all honesty. The highs and lows you go through in sport are immense. That's because we all care so much for what we're doing," said Russell.
"I remind myself I'm 28 years old. I see Lewis still competing extremely well at 41 and Fernando at 44. Lewis won the majority of his titles in his 30s.
"This year is absolutely not going to define my career as a whole. It's not going to break me. If anything, it's going to make me stronger." Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player Russell pointed to an unusual trend where he's generally bounced back strongly from poor weekends or misfortune, including an underwhelming race in Madrid where Antonelli won, before a dominant performance on his way to pole and victory at the next race in Baku.
"I've been pretty proud of my resilience and how I've bounced back from very tough moments," he explained. "Actually through my lowest points of this season, I've generally bounced back really, really strong then I had another bad race, after the good one, so maybe it's something I need to analyse as well because I always perform best after my worst races, which is maybe just a coincidence, maybe there's something in it. "I've been racing more years of my life than I haven't.
I've had more successful years than relative failures, and I don't think any athlete, no matter how great, has every single year of their career performing at their highest level. "Unfortunately, this year for me has come at maybe the time when I needed it most. But it's by no means the end of my journey.
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