Heir to Hamilton’s throne: Antonelli is F1’s next big thing

Andrea Kimi Antonelli has a celebration trick. Title any race weekend he has pushed in and he can reply along with his qualifying lap time right down to a tenth of a second.

When you think about he has pushed in additional than 30 qualifying periods at greater than 20 circuits up to now two years alone, that is rather a lot to recollect. Earlier than chatting with Antonelli about his path to Formula 1, ESPN needed to put him to the take a look at.

“What was your qualifying time in Imola, Components 2 this 12 months?”

“A 1:27.3,” he says confidently. Appropriate.

“Budapest, F2?”

“1:30.3.” Bang on.

“How about two years in the past within the Components Regional European Championship. Let’s strive Q1 at Mugello?

“It was a 1:42.4 and Q2 was 1:42.6.” Appropriate once more.

“Lap time is so vital for me,” Antonelli defined. “You all the time wish to get the quick lap occasions and so they type of get caught into my head with out even doing it on function.”

As exceptional as this next-level reminiscence recreation is, the performances behind these lap occasions are what have satisfied Mercedes to decide on Antonelli as Lewis Hamilton‘s substitute for subsequent 12 months.

The transfer will thrust the 18-year-old onto the largest stage in motorsport, doubtlessly presenting him with a automobile able to successful in his first 12 months in F1. Not since Hamilton made his debut with McLaren in 2007 — albeit on the age of twenty-two — has a group proven such confidence within the uncooked expertise of a rookie.

Staff boss Toto Wolff stated he made the choice to advertise Antonelli from Mercedes’ junior group inside 5 minutes of studying Hamilton was leaving for Ferrari, describing the selection to pair him with George Russell as “instinctive.” This was not a knee-jerk response to shedding the largest identify in motorsport, although. This was the conclusion of a plan that was greater than seven years within the making.

That is the coming-of-age of a driver earmarked for F1 since he was a boy.

Impressed by Senna

Born in Bologna to folks Elisabetta and Marco Antonelli, “Kimi,” as he prefers to be referred to as, has been surrounded by motorsport for so long as he can keep in mind. He insists his adopted identify will not be an homage to former Ferrari driver Kimi Räikkönen, who grew to become Components 1 world champion one 12 months after Antonelli’s start, however as an alternative the suggestion of a household pal who believed it could sound good between the double A’s of Andrea Antonelli.

Within the first few years of his life, there was no escaping the intoxicating world of motorsport. Marco, a racing driver himself, was the boss of a GT group, and Kimi’s early life had been spent in paddocks following his father’s racing outfit.

“I’ve been rising on the race observe since I used to be very younger, as a result of my dad, he was a racing driver,” Antonelli stated. “Since 1994 he runs his group in GT3, and now Components 4 as effectively, however primarily GTs. … I used to be going across the paddock, spending time contained in the storage, so I’ve been rising up on this setting my complete life.”

Marco noticed the good thing about beginning his son’s personal racing profession as early as doable, and Antonelli says there’s a photograph of him aged “1 or 2” propped up within the seat of a go-kart. By the point he was sufficiently old to achieve the pedals, he was out on observe, and so the journey to F1 started.

“My very first drive was after I was 5½ and was in a go-kart referred to as a Delfino — a child go-kart — and it was round a mini-bike observe in Forli,” he stated. “I simply keep in mind I used to be actually having fun with simply the sensation of the pace. That was the factor that I actually appreciated.”

Antonelli entered his first official go-kart race aged 8, within the EasyKart 60 class, and received by a margin of seven seconds. In EasyKart the emphasis was on equal equipment, thereby permitting future expertise to shine by means of, and by the point he was 9, Antonelli had received his first championship — topped after a exceptional drive from twenty first on the grid to win within the ultimate.

Racing was Antonelli’s world, and it did not take lengthy for the objective of racing in F1 to crystalize in his thoughts.

“Because the very starting I did not have the rest in thoughts,” he stated. “I feel I spotted on the age of 9 that racing was what I actually needed to do. Round that point, I began to compete at a excessive degree and I used to be seeing that I used to be going fairly effectively and I used to be having fun with it as effectively, so I knew that was what I needed to do.”

Away from the kart observe, Antonelli continued to dwell and breathe motorsport. He adopted F1 on TV, and when there wasn’t a dwell race to observe, his father launched him to the game’s historical past on DVDs. As he watched grainy footage of races from the Eighties and Nineties, one driver stood out to the impressionable, younger go-karter above all others: Ayrton Senna.

“With my father, particularly after I was little, we used to observe so many races and a few from DVDs,” he defined. “I simply keep in mind taking a look at Ayrton, and particularly what was actually spectacular was his qualifying lap. I believed to myself, ‘I like this driver,’ after which I simply began to examine him and watch extra movies about him, simply to get extra data about him.”

When Antonelli makes his F1 debut subsequent 12 months, it is going to be with the No. 12 on his automobile. It’s the similar quantity Senna used throughout his time at Lotus from 1985 to 1987 and in his first championship-winning season with McLaren driving the long-lasting MP4-4 in 1988. Regardless of being born 12 years after Senna’s tragic loss of life on the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix, Antonelli says the quantity is devoted to his largest racing hero.

“It is a quantity I like as effectively, it seems to be fairly cool, however it’s additionally for [Senna],” Antonelli added. “I’m impressed by him and naturally to race that quantity, on my aspect, brings a little bit of duty as effectively.”

A rising star

Antonelli’s first contact with Mercedes got here in 2017. Wolff had been made conscious of the Italian wunderkind by Giovanni Minardi — son of the founding father of the Minardi F1 group, Giancarlo — who had first noticed Antonelli on the very early levels of his karting profession.

Wolff despatched the top of Mercedes’ junior program, Gwen Lagrue, to verify if the hype round Antonelli was actual. Later the identical 12 months, the then-11-year-old was signed to a junior contract with the group on the peak of its domination of F1.

“It was finish of 2017, I used to be doing a go-kart race and we had simply had the [first] contact with Toto and Mercedes to make a deal and be part of their academy,” Antonelli stated. “So Gwen got here finish of 2017 to a go-kart race, one of many final couple of races of the 12 months, and he simply got here to observe to see how I used to be performing and behaving. They needed simply to verify and see how I used to be going, and from that time they might determine if they might signal me or not, and fortuitously it occurred.

“We now have a humorous image collectively, Gwen was in Mercedes equipment and I used to be racing in Tony Kart, which was supported by Ferrari, and there was this humorous image the place Gwen was protecting the Ferrari brand on my jacket. That was the primary time I met Gwen.”

It raises the query how Antonelli, who grew up simply 30 miles from Ferrari’s base in Maranello, was not seen by the Italian group earlier than Wolff and Lagrue.

“Tony Kart was the principle group, supported by Ferrari, however to be sincere there was not a lot contact,” Antonelli stated. “I do not actually keep in mind precisely as a result of I used to be like 11. We weren’t actually involved, however ultimately we received the decision from Mercedes and we had no doubts and simply accepted.”

It was a significant step in Antonelli’s burgeoning profession, however at the moment F1 was nonetheless a good distance off. There was an growing development in F1 groups signing younger go-karters to their academies, however for each one which makes the F1 grid, there are dozens extra who get reduce free alongside the way in which.

Even so, Antonelli was seen as one thing particular proper from the beginning. When he was nonetheless competing in go-karts in Italy in 2018, he was invited to the Monaco Grand Prix to satisfy Wolff for the primary time. A photograph exists on-line of a younger Antonelli stood by Wolff’s aspect throughout a follow session in Mercedes’ engineering workplace, with outsized headphones from the pit wall throughout his head.

“I used to be excited and a bit nervous,” Antonelli recalled of the second. “I used to be little or no, I used to be solely 12. Then I stood subsequent to him within the storage without spending a dime follow and that was a cool expertise.”

From 2025 onward, that very same child who stood subsequent to Wolff in Monaco will probably be sat in one in all Mercedes’ vehicles on the F1 grid. Even inside the sink-or-swim world of grand prix racing, Antonelli’s development has occurred at breakneck pace, however Wolff’s reasoning is that the sheer tempo the Italian has proven will finally win by means of.

Questions had been raised over Mercedes’ judgement when Antonelli had a giant crash on his second flying lap in an F1 follow session at this 12 months’s Italian Grand Prix. The thought had been to present him a run in Friday follow forward of his official affirmation as an F1 driver, however the plan relatively backfired when Antonelli took an excessive amount of pace into the Parabolica and slid into the limitations.

Wolff was completely satisfied to write down off the incident as a studying expertise, and whereas chatting with the media afterward, he emphasised the pace Antonelli had proven simply moments earlier whereas pushing the automobile to the restrict on his first flying lap.

“Most significantly he’s OK as a result of the crash was 52G, in order that’s vital,” Wolff stated. “We’re investing in his future and these moments, they’ll occur. They’ll proceed to occur subsequent 12 months.

“We might relatively have an issue in slowing him down than making him quicker. What we noticed from one and a half laps was astonishing.”

Even earlier than he was named as Hamilton’s successor, Antonelli was creating headlines in decrease classes. In 2022, representing Italy on the Motorsport Video games (an Olympics-like competitors for Components 4 drivers at Paul Ricard), he received the competitors whereas racing with a damaged wrist.

After he had already set a time quick sufficient to safe pole place in qualifying, Antonelli was making an attempt to enhance when he collided with a slower automobile on the finish of the session. On affect, his steering wheel snapped in his arms and he felt a pointy ache in his left wrist. He determined to race on with the assistance of ache killers and received the qualifying race with the quickest lap earlier than successful the characteristic race by seven seconds.

“I did not know [my wrist was broken],” he recalled. “It was painful however I might nonetheless transfer it barely.

“As soon as the race was over it was actually swollen and in addition the colour was not so good! It was type of black, so I believed perhaps one thing was flawed with the wrist — and after the race weekend I could not actually transfer it. The ache was there — primarily within the first part of the race, as a result of then whenever you get driving and the muscle will get sizzling and with adrenaline you’re feeling much less ache, however yeah, it was painful.”

One other story to burnish the Antonelli legend emerged this 12 months when he joined a take a look at in Euro Components vehicles (previous F3 vehicles) at Silverstone with a view to study the circuit. Various present F3 and F2 drivers had been additionally current for a similar motive, however this being the UK, the observe was soaking moist when the take a look at received underway.

Wolff recollects that Antonelli “was 4 seconds faster than the remaining” on his first flying lap. Antonelli does not hype the story in fairly the identical method, however says the lap time merely got here simply to him on the moist observe.

“I used to be feeling actual confidence in that take a look at and within the moist,” he stated. “I’ve to say I really like moist circumstances. I really feel very snug in any automobile, and I really feel good as a result of I can simply drive by intuition with none considering.”

What makes Antonelli so quick?

There was one clear theme in Antonelli’s comparatively quick profession: uncooked tempo. Irrespective of the step in efficiency requested of him, whether or not it’s by means of numerous ranges of go-karting, the large leap from karts to Components 4 vehicles or the choice to skip Components 3 and go straight to Components 2, he has been capable of adapt remarkably shortly.

By all accounts, he will get in a brand new automobile and has an innate capability to find its limits and set lap occasions past the expectations of his engineers. Refining that right into a rounded package deal with the consistency wanted to win races is typically an extended course of, however the preliminary tempo is all the time there. So the place does that pace come from?

“I feel it is as a result of I drive rather a lot by feeling and by intuition,” Antonelli stated. “Each time I bounce in a automobile for a brand new observe, the principle factor I attempt to do is go as quick as doable immediately. Particularly after I’m feeling snug with the automobile, I really feel like I’ve numerous confidence to actually push the automobile, and it is one thing that I had from a really younger age — to go immediately and be on it from the very starting.”

The step to F1 will probably be his largest but and comes with the added strain of racing for Mercedes on motorsport’s largest stage. To arrange Antonelli, the group has laid out a collection of personal F1 exams at numerous circuits this season, which he has dovetailed along with his F2 marketing campaign.

Driving a two-year-old automobile to adjust to F1’s testing restrictions, sources inside the group say his tempo has exceeded expectations. These exams had been a key consider confirming Wolff’s intuition that Antonelli is prepared for F1.

For Antonelli, nevertheless, there may be nonetheless extra to return.

“I’ve to say I felt very snug in F1 from the very starting, as a result of the automobile provides you numerous confidence,” he stated. “It isn’t simple to achieve the restrict as a result of the automobile can enable you a lot and provide you with a lot that you just maintain asking and he or she retains delivering.

“In fact, it is onerous to reach to that time the place you simply maintain asking and the automobile does not return any extra. It provides you numerous confidence to start out with, however to achieve absolutely the restrict will not be simple in any respect. It is one thing I’m nonetheless engaged on, as a result of I’m nonetheless in a part the place it’s nonetheless giving me rather a lot in testing and I’m working to reach to that edge with out going over it.”

Lap occasions from his personal exams haven’t been made public, and would probably imply little or no in the event that they had been. Differing circumstances, a two-year-old automobile and non-race tires make comparisons pointless till he hits the observe with the remainder of the F1 grid on the Australian Grand Prix in March.

It would not be shocking if Antonelli had already memorized the quickest ones, although. Proper right down to the final tenth of a second.