George Russell is the most dominant Formula One team-mate of the modern era

George Russell has a better record of beating his team-mate than any other driver to have started at least 50 races in the last 40 years, PA news agency analysis reveals.

Russell, who is outperforming Lewis Hamilton at Mercedes so far in 2022, has finished ahead of his team-mate in 49 of his 69 Grands Prix since making his debut in 2019.

His success rate of 71 per cent is better than all of the leading drivers going back to the early 1980s, when constructors were first limited to a maximum of two cars.

Current world champion Max Verstappen is next on the list, having finished ahead of his team-mate in 97 of his 150 races to date (65 per cent), ahead of Fernando Alonso (65 per cent), Michael Schumacher (63 per cent) and Hamilton (61 per cent).

While much of Russell’s early success came towards the back of the grid, when he was outperforming Robert Kubica and Nicholas Latifi at Williams, his performances against Hamilton bode well for title challenges in future.

The 24-year-old Briton has beaten seven-time world champion Hamilton in seven out of nine races in 2022, finishing in the top five on each occasion.

Russell leads his compatriot by 34 points in the championship, which is the largest cushion that a team-mate has ever enjoyed over Hamilton heading into the British Grand Prix.

This is all the more impressive given Hamilton’s overall record against his team-mates, who include three former world champions in Alonso, Jenson Button and Nico Rosberg.

Hamilton has come out on top 182 times in 297 Grands Prix, with his tally of race wins and pole positions (both 103) around double that of his team-mates – 45 and 52 respectively.

Among former team-mates, only Alonso has a winning record over Hamilton when driving the same