Russell refutes suggestion he got lucky in Saudi Arabia as Hamilton aims to clarify Jeddah comments

Russell finished fourth in Jeddah, though he looked set to take third place when Fernando Alonso was penalised.

Aston Martin managed to overturn that decision, leaving Russell in fourth, one place ahead of Mercedes team-mate Hamilton.

Seven-time Formula One world champion Hamilton seemed to suggest after the race that Russell made a fortunate choice when deciding to alter his set-up.

Hamilton claimed that call would "more often than not" have been wrong. Russell, however, disagrees.

Speaking to reporters ahead of the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne, Russell said: "I don't think there's any luck in it at all.

"I think it's down to the preparation you put in before the event.

"The changes we made overnight, I knew that was going to be the right direction with the work we did with the team. And I believed it was going to be better than the set-up that Lewis opted for.

"I think everybody's got different preferences, I was happy with the direction I took and the work I'm doing with the engineers."

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Keen to avoid any animosity, Hamilton sought to clarify what he had meant in Jeddah.

He said: "I want to reiterate how great a job George did.

"I think the thing I was commenting on is that there's one specific thing that you can change in the suspension that you have to do over Friday night, and when you make that change, once you start P3, you can't change it for the rest of the weekend, so when you make that change, you're basically rolling the dice. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

"I've done it in the past. Sometimes it hasn't worked, sometimes it has, and it worked great for George and he did a great job.