Between 2014-21 the Brackley team won the constructors’ title eight times and took seven drivers’ titles between Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg.
Its form took a dive with the W13 under the new aerodynamic regulations last year, and it has only scored one win over the last two seasons.
A series of updates has improved this year’s W14, but in recent races Russell has questioned the set-up direction, especially after bouncing became an issue at Spa.
“I think this weekend's validated that probably the direction we've taken with the set-up in recent races hasn't been the right one,” said Russell when asked by Autosport if he felt more comfortable at Spa.
“We suffered with a huge amount of bouncing today. A number of teams did, maybe not as severe as we did, still obviously a bit of a shame to see that as a sport at the pinnacle the majority of teams are still struggling with bouncing. I hope something can be solved in that regard in the future.”
Asked if it was a set-up issue that could be addressed rather than a general trend with the updates, he said: “Yeah, definitely can be tweaked. I think we're working really hard on the characteristics for next year.
“We're looking a lot at how the previous generations of cars were for Mercedes during the glory years, and using that as a bit of inspiration, as clearly that was one of the best cars in history. So that's given us some pointers on where we need to try and aim for.”
Asked to sum up the first part of the season, Russell said: “A [first part of a] season of two halves. So, I'd say the first six races were really strong. The last six races not so much. A few ideas why that is, quite a lot of missed opportunities this season for various reasons.
“Some from mistakes of my own, some like the failure in Australia cost me a lot of points. But nevertheless, if you're not fighting for P1 in the drivers’ championship, you just want to maximise the constructors’, and so far we're kind of doing that.
“I'm sure we're going to be strong in the second half of the season. And we've got some little things come in after the break.
“But I'm confident we can secure the second best team [position], and try and close that gap further.”
