Andrea Kimi Antonelli might make his Components 1 debut earlier than the season is over, in response to among the hypothesis earlier this 12 months.
However even when he has to attend longer than that it appears a near-certainty that Mercedes junior driver will find yourself on the F1 grid.
George Russell, who’s at present with out a crew mate for subsequent season at Mercedes, believes that Antonelli is “little doubt going to be a Components 1 driver sooner or later”.
Not but legally sufficiently old to race in F1, the 17-year-old has a degree of hype round him not seen since one other teenager, Max Verstappen, made his record-shattering F1 debut again in 2015. The principles launched by the FIA following Verstappen’s debut, such because the 18-year age restrict, are doubtlessly all that has stored Antonelli from arriving even earlier.
After letting a possibility to have Verstappen of their steady slip by means of their fingers all these years in the past, Mercedes are wanting to harness probably the most excellent younger skills of his technology – particularly as Lewis Hamilton can be leaving the crew on the finish of the season, leaving them a seat to fill.
On the face of it, Antonelli’s performances on this 12 months’s F2 championship give few clues why he’s being hailed as ‘the following huge factor’. After 10 races, Antonelli lies sixth within the championship, his greatest end a trio of fourth locations, with no wins and even podiums to his identify.
So what’s it about Antonelli that has led Mercedes to contemplate him as a viable candidate to interchange probably the most profitable F1 driver of all time?
2014-21: The karting years
The son of touring automotive and GT racer Marco Antonelli, who based the Antonelli Motorsport crew, Kimi – as he prefers to be referred to as – arrived on Mercedes’ radar earlier than their final newcomer, George Russell, made his grand prix debut.
A a number of champion in varied junior Italian karting sequence, Antonelli started to forge a relationship with Mercedes in 2018 earlier than he was a youngster, not but having even arrived at OK Junior degree. He was excellent in mini karts in 2018 earlier than stepping as much as the CIK-FIA degree in 2019, formally signing as a Mercedes junior in April the 12 months Russell turned an F1 driver.
Antonelli completed second within the OK European championship behind Marcus Amand however forward of Ferrari junior Tuukka Taponen, then took fifth place on the earth championships in Finland, behind present F2 rival Pepe Marti. Antonelli confirmed enchancment the following season in 2020, taking that 12 months’s CIK European championship. Nonetheless, after a crash with Maya Weug throughout a chaotic begin to the world championship race on the Algarve circuit left him with a damaged leg, Antonelli was unable to compete for the world title.
The subsequent season in 2021 was one other profitable one. He defended his European title within the OK class, however regardless of qualifying fourth for the world championship race in Sweden, a poor begin dropped him out of competition and he completed outdoors the highest 10.
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2021-2022: Moving into single-seaters
Earlier than the tip of 2021, Antonelli made his first main step in the direction of his future by making his debut in automobiles within the Italian F4 championship. Antonelli joined the sequence from September for the ultimate 9 races with Prema alongside future F2 crew mate Oliver Bearman. He completed ninth in his first ever automotive race, then secured a podium end in every of the three races at Monza for the ultimate spherical of the championship.
The next 12 months of 2022 was 15-year-old Antonelli’s first full season in automotive racing out of karting. Racing within the F4 degree, the Mercedes junior was the standout Components 4 driver of the 12 months. He received his first two races of the 12 months within the UAE F4 championship at Yas Marina, operating a part-schedule of simply eight races of which he reached the rostrum at 5.
Returning to Europe, he led the whole German F4 sequence, cruising to the championship with 9 wins. Combining this marketing campaign along with his first full season of Italian F4, he took the highest step of the rostrum in a exceptional 13 of the 22 races to secured his second F4 title in a single season.
In direction of the tip of the 12 months within the FIA’s Motorsport Video games occasion at Paul Ricard, Antonelli had an opportunity to punctuate his dominant F4 12 months by profitable the F4 cup. Regardless of breaking his wrist throughout qualifying, he nonetheless managed to safe pole place. Then, even whereas nursing an damage, he led each single lap from pole to take a gutsy and extremely spectacular victory.
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2023: Additional success in Components Regional
After F4, the following step up the only seater pyramid is just not Components 3, however slightly Components Regional. As soon as once more, Antonelli started his 12 months within the Center East, competing within the Components Regional Center Japanese Championship in opposition to a number of fellow F1 juniors like Ferrari’s Dino Beganovic and Alpine’s Gabriele Mini.
Antonelli received three races out of the 15 over the month-long season with seven podiums and three pole positions. He took the title by a wholesome 40-point margin over Taylor Barnard. It was his third successive championship victory from the final three sequence he had competed in.
May Antonelli construct on that success within the coveted Components Regional European Championship and add a fourth title in two years? He put himself in a robust place to begin the season with three second place finishes from the opening 4 races.
His first victory of the marketing campaign got here within the second race at Spa-Francorchamps. Nonetheless, it was not a victory he might take any pleasure from, as MP racer Dilano van ‘t Hoff suffered deadly accidents in an appalling accident alongside the Kemmel Straight in low visibility circumstances.
The sequence continued one week later at Mugello. Antonelli took second place in race one, then victory within the second and remaining race of the weekend. He was now simply two factors off the championship chief, Martinius Stenshorne, on the midway level of the championship.
Antonelli secured three extra victories and 5 podium finishes from the ultimate ten races of the season to comfortably safe the title by slightly below 40 factors over Stenshorne by the tip of the championship. On high of that, his cross on Nikhil Bohra on the ultimate lap of the season on the Nurburgring received Prema the groups’ title.
His FREC success meant Antonelli had taken the highest prize in each of the competitions he had been entered in for 2023, and his fifth important title win in simply two full calendar years racing in single-seaters.
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2024: On the cusp of Components 1
Antonelli’s success at a Components Regional degree in 2023 left Mercedes questioning what to do with their brightest junior prospect for the following season. The logical step ahead for the 17-year-old could be Components 3, the place he would enter as probably the overwhelming favorite. Nonetheless, Mercedes opted to push for him to leap straight up into Components 2, with the identical Prema crew he had loved a lot success with over the earlier two years.
He isn’t the primary driver to make the soar from Components Regional to F2, and even this just one this 12 months. However the leap in efficiency between the 2 classes shouldn’t be underestimated.
Going from Components Regional’s 270bhp of Tatuus T-318, bypassing the 380bhp Dallara F3 automotive to leap straight right into a 620bhp 2024 F2 automotive with a turbocharged engine, a most pace of over 200mph with DRS and lateral a great deal of virtually 4G, that is by far the most important soar in automotive efficiency Antonelli has skilled. Nonetheless, teaming him alongside Bearman, one other teenager gunning for a title and an F1 seat for 2025, crew principal Rene Rosin had no doubts about his potential to step straight into F2.
“He has been with us for the reason that very starting so not solely do we all know him effectively, however we’re additionally notably happy with what he was in a position to obtain in his first two years full-time in single seaters,” Rosin mentioned. “Kimi is a gifted racer and an incredible crew participant.”
However simply days earlier than the pre-season take a look at in Bahrain, Antonelli’s debut F2 marketing campaign all of a sudden took on an entire new that means when Mercedes confirmed Lewis Hamilton would go away them on the finish of 2024. Though Toto Wolff insisted that they didn’t wish to rush Antonelli or put strain on him over his first season in F2, he was now a authentic candidate for the F1 seat that Mercedes now needed to fill for 2025.
If the choice to advertise Antonelli into F2 was partly motivated by a brand new chassis for the 2024 season placing the inexperienced drivers on a extra even keel with these with at the least a 12 months below their belts, it appeared to have backfired within the opening spherical in Bahrain the place Prema endured a torrid weekend. However the crew bounced again instantly in Jeddah, Bearman securing pole place earlier than having to desert his F2 automotive to behave as substitute for Carlos Sainz Jnr at Ferrari.
Over the opening ten races of the championship, Antonelli stays but to take a high three end – the one driver within the high 12 locations within the championship to not have a podium. However given his lack of expertise of a racing automotive this highly effective, to not point out lots of the tracks which made up the opening rounds, he has demonstrated a misplaced of potential.
Antonelli has solely failed to attain factors twice since that tough opening spherical of the season in Bahrain and positioned within the high 5 in three of his final 5 races. That consistency might go an extended technique to serving to him transfer additional up the standings. He’s 32 factors off chief Paul Aron (who misplaced his place on Mercedes’ younger driver programme on the finish of final 12 months) with 351 obtainable.
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Following the Components 2 spherical in Melbourne, Antonelli had his first ever run in a Components 1 automotive on the Pink Bull Ring in April, driving Mercedes’ 2021 constructors’ championship-winning W12. Quickly after, the examined a floor impact F1 for the primary time by operating the 2022 W13 at Imola.
That is a part of a wider programme of assessments in F1 equipment designed to arrange Antonelli for his eventual debut. The actual fact the crew goes to this size to arrange him exhibits how critical they’re about giving him an F1 probability.
Most not too long ago, Antonelli was again in an F1 cockpit at Silverstone, operating together with Russell and the crew’s reserve driver, Mick Schumacher. His progress has been the main focus of big media curiosity, prompting Mercedes to disclaim his final run was a ‘shootout’ between him and Schumacher to assist resolve who ought to fill Hamilton’s 2025 seat. Mercedes insisted the pair and Russell ran fully separate programmes that might not be in contrast.
This week, Antonelli can be again in a Components 1 automotive but once more – this time on the Circuit de Catalunya in Barcelona. Whereas Mercedes don’t make any selections about their driver line up quickly, it appears as if they may have copious quantities of personal testing information from which to resolve whether or not they wish to promote a soon-to-be 18-year-old into their seat for 2024 and even foyer a buyer crew like Williams to take him on as a substitute. Till that call is made, all Antonelli must deal with is on scoring factors in Components 2 and pushing for that elusive podium.
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