George Russell placed 11th on Friday after Formula 1’s first outing at the Autódromo Internacional do Algarve for the Portuguese Grand Prix.

The Brit, along with the rest of the grid, suffered from a lack of grip early in the morning session. The newly resurfaced asphalt combined with the unfamiliar circuit made it difficult for George and he ended the morning in 18th.

The first 30 minutes of the afternoon session was dedicated to testing the new 2021 prototype tyres for Pirelli, but returned back to the remainder of the sessions, George returned to the allocated range of tyres for the Portuguese Grand Prix weekend.

Despite ending the session in 11th, the stop/start session hindered George’s ability to full experience the track ahead of qualifying on Saturday afternoon.

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George Russell – Williams Racing Driver

"It was a relatively productive day, considering how many red flags there were. The track rubbered in incredibly quickly, those opening 20 minutes were really tricky, but then the grip levels felt really strong towards the end. I was really happy with my lap on the Medium tyre which we ended P11. All in all, not a bad day.

Looking further into the weekend, I think we are going to be fighting with Haas and the Alfas again. As FP2 was thrown out of the window due to the red flags, there are still a lot of unknowns as none of us got any high-fuel long running."

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George will return to track on Saturday morning for a further hour of practice ahead of qualifying in the afternoon.