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George Russell had a helping hand to his first Mercedes podium finish, but Martin Brundle says it cannot all be credited to the Safety Car.

After qualifying P6 for the Australian Grand Prix, sharing the third row with his Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton in P5, Russell came across a stroke of good fortune with the timing of a Safety Car period, allowing him to stop and then move ahead of Hamilton and Red Bull’s Sergio Perez into the podium places.

He went on to finish the race P3, having been overtaken by Perez but returning to the podium when Max Verstappen retired from P2.

But although Russell himself admitted to a double dose of luck in the form of that Safety Car and Verstappen’s DNF, ex-F1 racer turned pundit Martin Brundle explained that in order for Russell to benefit from that Safety Car, he still needed to be competitive both before and afterwards.

“George Russell got lucky with the Safety Car, but you need to be competitive before and after that to benefit and he certainly was,” Brundle wrote in his column for Sky Sports F1.

“He doesn’t appear to be struggling to keep with Lewis in qualifying or race trim and that’s impressive against the great man.”

The end result for Russell was that he left the Australian Grand Prix P2 in the Drivers’ Championship.

Of course, for pace alone he is not in the second fastest car on the grid right now, but Brundle explained Russell is in his position because his driving has been “classy” and “fault-free”, while the Mercedes W13 has