Russell started on pole and bagged the team’s first podium in Canada. Then in Austria, after Verstappen and Norris collided while battling for the lead, Russell surpassed both to inherit victory — his first since 2022. Further strong performances from the Briton followed in Azerbaijan (3rd), Singapore (4th), Brazil (4th) and Qatar (4th), but his best drive came in Las Vegas, as to even the surprise of Mercedes, Russell snagged pole position and never looked back, winning seven seconds clear of the trailing field.
Conversely, Hamilton struggled. After announcing his departure from the team just a few weeks prior to the season opener in Bahrain, the seven-time world champion seemingly struggled for motivation, at times even wanting to retire his car to the pitlane and step away from the team prematurely. However, there were moments when the old Hamilton roared.
After a podium finish in Spain, Hamilton captured his first race victory in 945 days at Silverstone and was back on top just 21 days later at Spa-Francorchamps. However from there it was mostly a downward spiral.
In his last ten races as a Mercedes F1 driver, Hamilton scored just 73 points compared to Russell’s 129, although his sour end to life as a sliver arrow was helped by one last visit to the podium in Las Vegas.
2025: Can young guns put Mercedes back on top?
Mercedes are still searching for answers in this current era of ground effect regulations. But despite its relative underperformance, the team has all intention of challenging for both world titles in 2025 instead of simply cutting its losses and pouring focus into 2026 — the first year of the new technical regulations.
“This is the crux of the matter every year, and especially if you have such a big regulatory change, are you going to compromise one year or the other?” said Wolff, in an exclusive interview with Autosport.
“But I’d like to take it from Niki’s [Lauda] motto, when being asked. ‘Would you rather win this one or the next one?’ And he says, ‘Both.’
“Nobody’s going to switch the machines off in January, unless you are really nowhere. But there is nothing to gain, because between P10 and P7 doesn’t make a difference for us anyway. We are fighting for victories and podiums, and cannot write it off.”
Mercedes also have two young drivers at their disposal in Russell and Antonelli, who could both be in contention for regular podium apperances and race victories should the Brackley outfit hit the ground running.
Mercedes-AMG 2025 F1 driver line-up
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| Kimi Antonelli | George Russell |
- Kimi Antonelli comes in to replace the departing Lewis Hamilton
- Russell is seen as Mercedes-AMG’s long-term project, and thought to be committed to a deal at least until the end of 2025
- Valtteri Bottas will act as reserve driver for the 2025 season
Key personnel
Team Principal: Toto Wolff
Whether it’s first-banging and irate finger-pointing in the garage, or simply winding up Christian Horner with irreverent comments to pundits, Toto Wolff has become one of the most recognisable people in the grand prix paddock. But don’t let any of that fool you, he’s also one of the most determined to get Mercedes-AMG back on top of the pile. Repeat winning hasn’t diminished his appetite for it, and he’s clear in his message.
Wolff himself said about this forthcoming year: “I believe we’ve taken some proactive steps to close that gap. Is it going to be good enough? I don’t know. But we’re going to see it in testing and then in the first race in Bahrain.
“I’m super excited. I’d like to start going now. It’s the stopwatch that’s going to tell us what job we’ve done.”
Race engineer: Peter Bonnington
Peter Bonnington — or Bono as he’s usually known — will step into a new role for Mercedes in 2025, after 11 straight seasons as Lewis Hamilton’s race engineer.
Midway through the 2024 campaign, it was announced that Bono had been made Mercedes’ head of race engineering with immediate effect — a role that would continue into 2025.
Following the Briton’s departure to Ferrari, Bono has also elected to remain on the pitwall, and will race engineer either Russell or Antonelli in 2025. The latter is favourite to get the nod.