George Russell impressed as he won the 2026 Azerbaijan Grand Prix, securing a Grand Slam result after cruising to victory for most of the race.
Leading through lap one, the Mercedes driver built a lead of around 10 seconds by about halfway through the race before chaos ensued with Safety Car deployments.
The first was on Lap 31, when Alexander Albon found himself stuck in the wall at Turn Six, and the Race Director opted to slow the field under Safety Car conditions rather than deploy a red flag.
With strong pace on the Medium tyres, the Safety Car let him pit for a set of Softs, which had shown far less degradation than predicted, with most soft runners staying on the compound for most of the race.
On the restart, Russell led again before carnage behind at Turn 1 saw the second deployment of the Safety Car after Franco Colapinto locked up and barrelled into his fellow Alpine driver Pierre Gasly, collecting Lando Norris in the process.
Russell’s second restart kept him ahead, but the gap behind was not as large as it was after his long stint in the first half of the race.
The two Red Bulls had pace, with Max Verstappen chasing down Oscar Piastri, who locked up and tumbled out of the points, allowing both Red Bulls to charge towards the Mercedes ahead.
On the final lap, Valtteri Bottas found himself in the wall at Turn 15, forcing Russell to lift through the double yellow flags, which compromised his power and caused him to lose his turbo doing so.
Verstappen was right on his tail onto the straight; however, Russell’s Mercedes power was just enough to beat the Red Bull over the line, winning by the narrowest margin this season at 0.1 seconds.
Holding on for his third win of the season and first since Austria, Russell completed the Grand Slam: taking pole position, fastest lap, leading every lap, and winning the race.
When asked post-race about where he found the confidence, he credited his experience with the new driving style adopted for the new generation of car.
“Every race since the break, I feel like I’ve gone from strength to strength and I feel like more myself again,” he said.
“No matter what happens towards the end of the season, I’ll be happy because it’s been a real tough period for me, but I feel like I’ve come through the other side.”
His win sees him take 15 points out of Kimi Antonelli’s championship lead, reducing the points gap to 66.
