### Russell to Begin US Grand Prix from Pitlane after Qualifying Incident

George Russell is set to start from the pitlane in the upcoming United States Grand Prix due to a breach of parc ferme rules by the Mercedes team. The British driver faced this setback after a crash in Q3 at Austin, which significantly damaged his W15 car when he collided with the barriers at Turn 19.

The crash resulted in the destruction of a new upgrade package that Mercedes had introduced for this race, leaving the team in a bind as there were no spare parts available for the new developments. Although Lewis Hamilton, who had an unsuccessful Q1 and qualified 19th, offered his upgrades to Russell to maintain his sixth spot on the grid, the team found it impractical to make extensive changes on both cars.

Consequently, the team decided to revert Russell’s car to the previous specification used up until the Singapore Grand Prix. Despite being allowed to change specifications on sprint weekends if spare parts are unavailable, the process required more effort than could be accomplished within normal parc ferme time constraints. This necessitated working on the car overnight and resulted in the parc ferme covers being left off, thereby breaching the rules and mandating a pitlane start for Russell.

In a team statement, Mercedes explained: "We had to work on the car overnight during the car's covered period. The workload involved in that was due to reverting on specification to what we ran in Singapore."

Starting from the pitlane means both Mercedes drivers will have a challenging race ahead, with Russell and Hamilton starting well down the order. Hamilton, originally 19th, will now begin 17th on the grid, benefiting from Russell's drop and a penalty for RB's Liam Lawson due to an engine change.