George Russell pinpoints Pau Grand Prix F3 fightback

The 17-year-old Brit followed up a win at Silverstone on his first F3 weekend with a tough outing at Hockenheim, where he netted just two points for a ninth-place finish.

Carlin driver Russell is one of just 10 drivers from the 35-strong field to have experience of Pau, having contested last year's Formula Renault ALPS support races on the French street circuit.

Prior experience of Pau is even more important this year - due to the size of the field, the drivers have also been split into groups for free practice, giving each only 40 minutes to learn the track instead of 80.

And Russell will benefit from the way the field has been split for qualifying - as is tradition for Pau - into odd and even-numbered runners, with one driver from each group lining up on each row of the grid.

The current top three in the championship all carry odd numbers, meaning Antonio Giovinazzi, Charles Leclerc and 2014 Pau GP winner Felix Rosenqvist will all run together. Leclerc, like Russell, raced at the track in Renault ALPS last year.

Meanwhile, Russell is set to take on 2012 McLaren AUTOSPORT BRDC Award winner Jake Dennis for at least a front-row spot in the even split.

"I don't really look at it that way, because I'm aiming to be fastest of everyone anyway," said Russell.

"There are still drivers in my group who will be fast - Jake was extremely competitive last year at Pau and this is his third visit there."

Russell knows his experience of the track will prove crucial.

"One hundred per cent it will be a massive benefit," he said, "especially with how the timetable is now, with just two 20-minute free practice sessions for everyone.

"It was a good choice to do ALPS last year."

AUTOSPORT SAYS
Marcus Simmons, AUTOSPORT magazine deputy editor (@MarcusSimmons54)

You might think that the split qualifying groups for Pau are rather imbalanced, and you'd be right.

One alternative way of splitting the groups is into alternate positions from championship order.

If this happened then teams could find themselves working frantically to get all their runners into one session, leaving them operationally at a disadvantage compared to those whose drivers are split more evenly.

Applying championship order for this weekend, that would give Carlin five drivers - Antonio Giovinazzi (first); George Russell (fifth); Callum Ilott (13th); Ryan Tveter (17th); Tatiana Calderon (29th) - in one group, with just 10th-placed Gustavo Menezes in the other.

There's no question that, with Giovinazzi, Charles Leclerc and Felix Rosenqvist all running together, the odds-and-evens system gives Russell and Jake Dennis a massive boost in their bid for the front row on a circuit where it is harder to overtake than any other.

Of the other points scorers in their group, only Menezes has been to Pau before, while Maximilian Gunther, Markus Pommer, Brandon Maisano, Ilott and Pietro Fittipaldi all get their first taste of the unyielding streets on Friday morning.

There's bound to be the odd grumble about the weighting - not only at the front but at the back, where two or three drivers won't qualify - but this is a classic case of 'you can't please all the people all the time'.

Perhaps next year the teams need to get their heads together when they're working out which race number their leading drivers are going to carry...