Kimi Antonelli

Kimi Antonelli was held aloft on the podium at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodríguez by Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton. It felt appropriate that the newly-crowned youngest F1 Champion sat upon the shoulders of giants. Third place in Mexico City was more than ample to secure the title with four races of the season to run.

At times in 2026, the then-20-year old from Bologna, showed dazzling pace; more often though, the hallmark of his season was a sensible and pragmatic approach to taking what was available: to resort to popular cliché, Antonelli has shown maturity beyond his years.

Junior Formulae

Certain drivers start making an impression long before they reach the higher echelons of the single-seater pyramid. Max Verstappen was earmarked for great things in karts; so too Lando Norris and Lewis Hamilton. Antonelli was in the same category. The buzz around him grew, with words like ‘destiny’ being thrown around, before he was ten years old.

Andrea Kimi Antonelli (contrary to legend, not named after the former McLaren and Ferrari driver) is the fourth Mercedes driver and the third Italian to take the title. Born into a motorsports family, he began karting aged five, and swiftly progressed through local, domestic and finally international competition. He started winning titles in mini and OK-Junior classes, taking a South Garda Winter Cup, WSK Euro Series, Italian Championship, becoming a Mercedes Junior in April 2019 at the grand old age of 12. From there he went into the senior karting ranks with an Italian Championship, Euro Series and two European Championships in the OK category – the youngest in series history. A broken leg put paid to his OK World Championship aspirations in 2020, but he moved up to single-seaters midway through the 2021 season, a couple of weeks after his 15th birthday. Driving for Prema, he was scoring podiums by his third event, finishing all three races at Monza in the top three.

Italian F4 had some big hitters – but Antonelli dominated 2022. Across a 20-race season he took 13 victories, and 14 poles, comfortably taking the title ahead of Alex Dunne and Rafael Camara. He also took the ADAC F4 title, with nine victories across the 15 races he entered. In the years that followed, the trophy cabinet continued to swell: in 2023, he won Formula Regional titles in Europe and the Middle East. On the basis of his domination in the lower-powered F3 category, he skipped the F3 Championship and jumped straight into F2.

2024 was something of a chastening season. All eyes were on Antonelli – clearly earmarked for greater things, but the powerhouse Prema team struggled with the new ground-effect Dallara F2-2024 chassis. Antonelli and team mate Ollie Bearman both sweated with a midfield car as Gabriel Bortoleto and Isack Hadjar battled for the title. Antonelli did manage victories, however, in the Silverstone Sprint and Hungaroring feature race – by which point a frenzied rumour mill was strongly suggesting he wouldn’t be back for a shot at the title in 2025.

F1 Driver

Antonelli’s 2024 F2 campaign dovetailed with a regular F1 tests in Mercedes’ historics and TPC programmes. He got a first taste of driving an F1 car at the Red Bull Ring, completing 500km in Mercedes’ championship-winning W12, across April 16-17… despite a late start to his programme caused by somewhat unseasonable snow blanketing the foothills of the Styrian Alps. His programme continued in the W13: first at Imola, with two days on his home track on April 29-30; then Silverstone – alongside George Russell and Mick Schumacher – and Barcelona also alongside Schumacher, in May and finally Spa-Francorchamps in July.

Mercedes, perfectly naturally, denied Antonelli’s testing programme was an assessment for a race seat and insisted it was all part of a standard development programme. Given Hamilton, at the top of the year, had announced 2024 would be his final year in silver, everyone else, also perfectly naturally, didn’t believe them. And so, when Antonelli was announced for his first FP1 session, at the Italian Grand Prix in late August, five days after his 18th birthday, the event had the feel of a coronation rather than an assessment.

That was fortunate for Kimi, who’s race weekend debut was famously fast and infamously short. Driving George Russell’s W15, he initially lit up the timesheet in front of his home audience, before swapping ends in Parabolica and thudding into the barriers just five laps into his run. It wasn’t the smoothly-choreographed investiture Mercedes were looking for – but regardless, they announced him as a 2025 race driver the following day.

Mercedes Race Seat

Antonelli’s first season at Mercedes was somewhat uneven, as would be expected of a teenage rookie, but his progress was never in doubt. Taking 12 as his racing number in homage to Ayrton Senna, he silenced any misgivings that did exist by finishing fourth in his first race, the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne. His introduction to F1 across 2025 was perhaps aided by a Mercedes car fast enough to score well, but not fast enough to be a serious contender for top honours. While he did his learning very much in the public eye, it did not come with the extra pressure of a title fight, or an intra-team battle, with the more experienced Russell comfortably outscoring the youngster. Where he did score heavily, however, was in the popularity stakes: he’s cheerful in several different languages, and frequently demonstrates a deep knowledge and unalloyed enthusiasm for motorsport – which wins a lot of friends in the paddock.

The highlights of Antonelli’s 2025 season were a first sprint pole position, in Miami, and a first podium, in Montreal. Around the Canadian Grand Prix, however, he experienced a dip in performance, failing to score in the three races either side. Something clicked after the summer break and he seemed entirely more comfortable in the car, putting together a string of strong results, culminating with two second places in Sao Paulo and third in Las Vegas. He finished the season seventh in the Drivers’ Championship, with Mercedes second in the Constructors’. It proved to be a springboard to higher achievement.

Champion

In 2025, Antonelli acquired a string of records that will be difficult to dislodge: youngest driver to lead a lap and youngest driver to set fastest lap – both at Suzuka; youngest Sprint pole in Miami; youngest Sprint podium at Interlagos. 150 points was the most points anyone has scored in a rookie season. He would add a clutch more records in 2026, including the one that matters most: youngest World Champion.

2026 brought unprecedented change to F1, with both a new aerodynamic formula and an entirely new power unit concept. After several years of very close racing, the expectation was that whichever works team had done the best job with their new power unit would enjoy an early season advantage. It became clear across winter testing that this team was Mercedes, making them title favourites.

The more-experienced Russell was the bookmakers’ pick, and this was underlined in Australia, when he duly took the first pole position of the year, three-tenths clear of Antonelli, and then converted that into victory at the head of an untroubled Mercedes 1-2. He doubled-down with six days later with victory in the Shanghai Sprint – but after that the Antonelli train got up to speed. Kimi took pole and victory for the Chinese Grand Prix, followed by pole and victory in Japan, pole and victory in Miami, victory in Canada, pole and victory in Monaco. By the time the run came to an end with a mechanical DNF in Barcelona, he had reset another sequence of records. In China: youngest polesitter; youngest driver to win from pole; youngest driver to record the hat-trick of pole, fastest lap and victory. In Japan: youngest leader of the Drivers’ Championship and youngest driver to win consecutive Grands Prix. At Monaco he joined a league of legends by becoming the youngest driver to record the fabled grand chelem of pole, fastest lap and victory having led every lap of a race. Of greater significance, however, he had his foot firmly on the throat of the Drivers’ Championship, 66 points clear of Lewis Hamilton.

Mercedes' dominance was transient, and by mid-season the four leading teams were all challenging for honours on a largely track-specific basis. Antonelli’s approach was both pragmatic and mature. He took the points on offer each week without overdriving. The points tally continued to mount with third in Austria, Sprint victory at Silverstone, another victory from pole at Spa, third in Hungary, and second at Zandvoort.

By this point, Russell was his nearest challenger, 59 points back. A large, but not insurmountable gap at the nominal halfway point of the season. Were Antonelli to be feeling the pressure, this is when it would start to tell. But it didn’t. In fact, the opposite happened. Antonelli’s homecoming at the Italian Grand Prix was the highlight of the season – of many seasons. With a quite brutal lack of romance, Mercedes decided Monza was the best place for Antonelli to take a tactical engine penalty. He qualified P7 after giving his team mate a tow in Q3, and then took a 30-place penalty that dropped him to P19 on the grid. From there he was astounding: every overtake clinical, every braking point and apex nailed, the fastest lap benchmark reset eight times. P14 after lap one, P12 after lap two, P8 on the resumption after a Safety Car interlude, P6 on lap seven, P5 on lap 10, P4 on lap 12, P3 on lap 13, P2 behind Russell on lap 16 and the lead by lap 18. Russell fought back, retook the lead, but when a VSC appeared and Antonelli elected to add another stop and Russell did not, no-one was really surprised when Kimi scythed through the field a second time to take and hold the lead four laps from home. He won again the following week in Madrid – but the 2026 Italian Grand Prix is where he broke the spirits of the chasing pack. Nothing was going to stop him.

The US Grand Prix become mathematically the first place Antonelli could take the title. He needed victory to do it, and have a decent gap between himself, Russell and Hamilton. He did his part with a seventh pole and ninth victory of the season, but his rivals did just enough to ensure his accession would be deferred to Mexico. He came to the Autodromo Hermanos Rodríguez with a 123 point lead over Russell, who was a point ahead of Hamilton. Ninth or better would guarantee the title to Antonelli, irrespective of what anyone else did. Starting fourth, he gave himself the best shot of winning by running a long first stint, and was in with a shot of the Hollywood finale, before the red flag demonstrated a complete indifference to the potential drama of the occasion. Antonelli had to settle for third – but it didn’t matter. The Foro Sol stadium went wild, race winner Max Verstappen and second placed Lewis Hamilton hoisted him into the air, and the new champion was crowned.

Worryingly for his rivals, in seven or eight years, Kimi Antonelli should hit his peak years as an F1 driver.