Mercedes Formula 1 driver George Russell has responded to former Red Bull Racing CEO and team principal Christian Horner's claims that he, Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri used to pay to use the Milton Keynes outfit's simulators.
Horner, who was dismissed from Red Bull last year, said on the High Performance podcast this week that all three drivers had paid to use the team's simulator when they were younger. According to Horner, the person running the simulator told him the three young drivers were better than those Red Bull already had, but Helmut Marko was not interested in signing them.
"I remember George Russell was paying us to go on our simulator, as was Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri. Their dads were writing cheques for them to run on the driver simulator that we had," Horner said.
"And the guy that was looking after it was coming up to me and saying, 'Christian, these kids are better than the juniors we've got at the moment.' I remember taking them to Helmut and going, 'Look, I really think you should look at these guys.'"
George Russell, Mercedes
Russell, who currently sits second in the drivers' championship, was asked about Horner's comments while speaking to the media ahead of the United States Grand Prix.
"So back in 2013, simulators weren't really a thing for anybody," the British driver explained. "Any junior teams didn't have simulators and there was an opportunity to do some driving on that simulator in the Formula Renault car, so it was more as preparation for testing and driving for the series that we were racing because, as I said, no teams had it. So that's the extent of it. That's all I'll say."
The United States Grand Prix is scheduled for 23-25 October at the Circuit of the Americas and kicks off the penultimate triple-header of the season.
To read more Motorsport.com articles visit our website.