George Russell has admitted he suffered a few bumps and bruises after branching out into extreme watersports over the summer break, but added he’s well rested, recovered and ready for the 2023 Dutch Grand Prix.
Russell signed off for the summer with an unremarkable sixth place at the Belgian GP, before trying out flyboarding and foiling on his holidays – admitting he mastered neither.
Russell‘s previously also surfed with teammate Lewis Hamilton – who said he didn’t think about Formula 1 for a second after leaving Spa – but this was a step out of his comfort zone.
“It was good to branch out and do some of these things, historically I’ve never really wanted to do any additional sports especially in the season in case of injury,” Russell said.
“But I felt like I wanted to try something new and keep my senses alive, the foiling and a few injuries along the way it’s fully recovered now and looking forward to the weekend.”
Russell added: “I mean when you fall off a foilboard… there’s a lot of videos I didn’t post off, falling off big time.
“But I really enjoyed it, I think for a lot of us when you’re so focused throughout the year, you get a bit bored after a bit of time having two full weeks of nothing.
“So to have a bit of an activity, it was quite fulfilling to sort of make some progress and not fall off by the last days.”
He’ll certainly hope that improvement translates back onto the track starting in Zandvoort – Russell‘s tie on 99 points with Charles Leclerc in the drivers’ championship and just seven points ahead of Carlos Sainz in a three-way battle for fifth.
Russell: Ricciardo’s done all his partying already
Russell also praised Daniel Ricciardo, who he met alongside Logan Sargeant watching Martin Garrix in Ibiza.
Ricciardo‘s summer break will have taken a less free-spirited turn after he was called up to replace Nyck de Vries at AlphaTauri ahead of the Hungarian GP, around a fortnight before the summer break.
However, he still seemingly found time to enjoy his holiday, as he attempts to lock down an F1 seat for 2024 and beyond having come back refreshed from his six-month sabbatical post-McLaren.
“I’m so fortunate! It was good, we both knew we were going to the same place, I bumped into Logan as well,” Russell said.
And after Max Verstappen jokingly asked whether they’d met at the salad bar, Russell added: “Daniel was very well-behaved, I was pretty impressed. So I think Daniel had done his partying in the six months prior. It was a good week.”
