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For all the column inches and social media conjecture throughout most of this year’s Formula One season, George Russell has seldom looked rattled at the myriad of questions thrown his way. Week after week, with a smile and an eyebrow arched, the 27-year-old has repeatedly knocked back suggestions of a shock exit from Mercedes despite the 2025 season, and his original deal, just six rounds from a conclusion.
Yet there was no rush. Once Max Verstappen had committed to Red Bull for next season, officially back in July, it was simply a formality, and now both Russell and 19-year-old Italian teammate Kimi Antonelli have penned fresh terms with Mercedes. Crucially, The Independent understands Russell has signed a multi-year extension, heading into 2026 and beyond.
“Confirming our driver line-up was always just a matter of when, not if,” said Mercedes F1 CEO Toto Wolff. “We wanted to take our time, handle the negotiations properly and make sure everyone, on all sides, was happy.”
For Russell, who has two wins to his name this year in Canada and Singapore, bringing his total win-tally up to five, it is justifiable reward for his best season in F1 to date. Noticeably, he has thrived as the team’s No 1 driver, in the absence of Lewis Hamilton.
In a typically capricious Mercedes car that has, at its worst, been the fourth quickest on the grid, the Brit from King’s Lynn has regularly squeezed every last drop of performance out of himself and his machinery to secure eight podiums in total. His sterling drive to second in Azerbaijan last month, despite illness, was testament to his meticulous and intense off-season training block.
But the delay in today’s announcement is illustrative of a driver who, heading into his fifth season with Mercedes and ninth in F1, knows what he wants and where he stands.
A new salary in the region of £30m-a-year will make Russell the third-highest earner on the grid, behind only Red Bull’s Verstappen and Hamilton at Ferrari. No small print was overlooked, with Russell (who is rather unusually managed by the team he races for in Mercedes) keen to limit his number of sponsor-related engagements away from the racetrack, in order to prioritise rest and recuperation in between race weekends.
For instance, 12 hours on from his win a fortnight ago in Singapore, Russell was in Kuala Lumpur for his annual visit in partnership with Mercedes’s title sponsor PETRONAS. “Feeling a bit tired now, got a few hours sleep and already here in Malaysia,” he said on arrival. In his new deal, no expense was spared in certifying the quantity and location of future appearances.
It is a move not dissimilar from Hamilton’s own desire to curb off-track outings in his latter, most successful years, with the Silver Arrows. It may seem trivial in the life of a sporting superstar who can afford the luxuries of a private jet – Russell has actually joked before on Netflix’s Drive to Survive how he is one of few leading drivers who often flies commercial – but in a sport of marginal gains, Russell is adamant that his own lifestyle choices can make as much of a difference to performance as a new rear-wing or suspension upgrade.
Furthermore, it made absolutely no sense for Russell to cast his eyes elsewhere. All the talk of the paddock is that Mercedes are the early frontrunners for next season, when new engine and chassis regulations threaten to shake up the pecking order.
Wolff and his team nailed the last massive engine rule-change in 2014, sparking the most dominant era in the sport’s history. The team at Brackley will be all too keen to wave goodbye to this ground-effect era of car, which has brought about just seven wins in 86 races, and look excitedly ahead at a new dawn.
And Russell, for a while now, has steadfastly maintained he is ready for a title challenge. He told The Independent back in May that his overall performance has undoubtedly improved, alongside his unignorable contentment with life away from the racetrack, at home in Monaco. His performances back up that assertion.
When will his opportunity arise? The signs currently point towards a 2026 charge for the championship, as Mercedes’s de facto No 1 driver (contrastingly to McLaren this year, future intra-team tension at Mercedes appears unlikely given Antonelli’s inexperience) and the quickest British driver in the sport right now.
Sure, Lando Norris may well be 77 points ahead this year, in his own intra-team title battle with Oscar Piastri. But their ranking as the top two in the drivers’ championship is entirely down to McLaren’s superiority. Given the performance gap, Russell deserves praise for being within a century of his compatriot.
So Russell can now sternly focus his efforts on the racetrack and away from the boardroom, starting this weekend in Austin, Texas. He’d be forgiven for not wanting to look beyond 2025, with all the possibilities that await in 2026. His staunch throwing down of the gauntlet to arch rival Verstappen in Abu Dhabi last year, with Wolff stood next to him in support amid a captivating press briefing, was emblematic of a man who is now aware of his value to Mercedes and his potential in the sport.
Finally, after nearly a decade in Formula One, Russell should next year have the opportunity he so desperately craves.
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