After Mercedes discovered themselves fourth quickest staff with a lackluster efficiency on the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix, staff principal Toto Wolff admitted his staff had made a mistake by persevering with to pursue its distinctive “zero pontoon” idea.
Wolff mentioned Mercedes must abandon their present philosophy to return to the highest in F1 and demanded “radical” design modifications.
Russell, who completed seventh and two locations behind team-mate Lewis Hamilton in Bahrain, stays hopeful Mercedes will begin to enhance with the deliberate upgrades.
“Numerous ideas, feelings, frustrations after Bahrain, however in a short time the staff got here collectively extremely properly, put their feelings apart, to strategy the decision-making course of in a practical means,” mentioned Russell to Sky.
“Attempting to consider what we have to do to get the efficiency again as quickly as potential.”
Russell added: “There’s positively a plan in place. It is clear the place we went flawed this winter.
“We in all probability overtook with the W13 by way of the aggressiveness of the automobile and the twists and turns that we confronted.
“After which we in all probability overshot in the wrong way with the W14 and compromised an excessive amount of efficiency with out bouncing again, however the lap time is not there to point out something.
“In fact, it is a powerful tablet for each member of the staff to swallow. This lack of efficiency is actually not on account of a scarcity of testing on anybody’s half.
“However large selections have been made and we might be leaping right into a barely completely different automobile.”
Nevertheless, the 25-year-old Briton warned that Mercedes have been making ready for a number of “powerful” races earlier than any progress was made.
“We might prefer to suppose we will discover efficiency eventually, however after I say sooner, it isn’t this weekend, or subsequent weekend,” he defined.
“It is positively in a couple of races. We’ve to be sensible and we now have to grasp the place we are actually.
“It should actually be tough for quite a lot of races to return. Pink Bull are in a category of their very own, however we actually need to deal with ourselves.
“As soon as we’re on observe, possibly we’ll discover efficiency quicker than anticipated. Who is aware of?”
Russell expects one other Pink Bull whitewash this weekend in Jeddah however thinks there might be a fierce battle between Mercedes, Ferrari and Aston Martin for the ultimate podium spot.
“It is a very completely different weekend in Arabia,” he mentioned. “The observe is completely completely different. The tarmac is completely different, which has an even bigger impact than folks notice.
“The battle may properly be on for the final step of the rostrum with Ferrari and Aston. It will not be, nevertheless it’s clear Pink Bull have loads of tempo of their fingers and I see them going for an additional 1-2 this weekend.
