Russell receives reprimand after opening day in Montreal

Despite his strong showing on the opening day at the Canadian Grand Prix, Mercedes driver George Russell has been hit with a reprimand for having failed to follow the race director’s instruction regarding the use of the escape road at Turn 14.

George Russell completed a different run plan to his rivals in the second practice session, running Pirelli's soft tyres at the beginning of the one-hour session before performing his qualifying simulation on the yellow-walled mediums.

The British driver was quickest come the end of the first day of the Canadian Grand Prix weekend, stopping the clocks in 1m12.123s in the second free practice session, a time just 28 thousandths of a second quicker than Lando Norris.

Despite his strong performance in FP2, Russell was found guilty of having failed to follow the race director’s instruction regarding the use of the escape road at turn 14. Having investigated the incident, the stewards have elected to hand out a reprimand to Russell.

The stewards' statement read: "The Stewards heard from the driver of Car 63 (George Russell), team representative and reviewed video and in-car video evidence.

"The driver of Car 63 explained that he had just pitted for new tyres and at turn 13 he lost the rear of the car and had no alternative but to leave the track to the left of the orange kerb on the inside of turn 14.

"He said that he was focussed on keeping the car off the wall and cut the orange line on the exit of turn 14. He said that he immediately realised that in so doing he had not complied with the instruction and apologised. No other cars were affected and the rejoining was not unsafe.

"In the circumstances we determined that a Warning was appropriate, consistent with earlier decisions for similar infringements in free practice at this circuit.