Mercedes Formula One driver George Russell has expressed disinterest in Netflix’s Drive to Survive “agenda,” stating that he does not care about his portrayal in the docuseries. Instead, he is focused on his performance for the 2025 season that kicks off this weekend at Australia’s Albert Park Grand Prix Circuit.
Russell’s comments arrive after he was shown having a panic attack in the recently released Series 7, according to Motorsport.com. Drive to Survive has attracted significant criticism in recent years, especially from Red Bull driver Max Verstappen, mainly for its alleged false portrayal of F1 driver rivalries.
However, Russell isn’t far behind this time, revealing that he only watched half of the episode that showed him suffering from the heat after the 2024 Singapore Grand Prix. Speaking to the media ahead of the season opener in Melbourne, he said:
“No, I’ve got to be honest, I’ve not seen the episode in full. I did hear and I was fed back that it was like two extremes from the first half to the last half. But ultimately I don’t really care how I’m portrayed there.
“I care how I perform in the car and how I work with my team, to be honest. So, there’s always an agenda for the best storyline possible, and that’s just the way the world is with these entertainment programmes. As I said, I haven’t even seen it and it’s not something that concerns me.”
Addressing the challenges from the Singapore GP last year, the Briton added:
“Again, to be honest, I didn’t even notice they were there. I’m just sort of so used to it now that they’re here, there and everywhere. Singapore was an exceptionally tough race for me last year. I think the body temperature was almost 42 degrees last year and when you think a fever is 40 degrees, 42 degrees in a race car is pretty exceptional.
“That was a tough one for me, and you know we’ve made some changes to try and make dealing with the heat better on the personal side but also from the cockpit side with the suppliers now working with Adidas – a huge help in that regard.”
Verstappen revealed that he hasn’t watched the latest season of Drive to Survive and acknowledged that it is hard to avoid clips from the series that appear on his social media feed. He said:
“I am not surprised. I didn’t watch it either, but unfortunately you can’t get out of it because those things come up on social media. You just have to ignore that quickly so it doesn’t come back in your feed again.”
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