Kimi Antonelli’s fate clear as F1 title declaration made | F1 | Sport

Kimi Antonelli has been told he “will be a champion” in Formula 1. And there is currently every chance the he might even be able to do it this year, in just his second season on the grid and as a 19-year-old, after a phenomenal start to the campaign which has seen him win three of the four Grands Prix held so far.

Team-mate George Russell was the pre-season favourite for the drivers’ title this year, with most expecting Mercedes to be the ones setting the pace. While that latter prediction turned out to be true, the Brit has been largely outshined by his far less experienced partner since winning on the opening weekend in Melbourne.

Antonelli’s Miami win last Sunday was his most impressive yet, as he held off defending champion Lando Norris in the latter half of the Grand Prix and did not buckle under the pressure applied by the McLaren star. Nor did he allow the gearbox issues his car suffered for a handful of laps take up too much of his focus.

It is now vital that the 19-year-old doesn’t get too carried away, and that was the message from former F1 team boss Guenther Steiner as he gave his take on Antonelli’s impressive performances and results. “The kid is doing a good job – do not change anything and don’t try to get ahead of yourself. Just stay calm and do what you’ve been doing,” he told Casino.org.

“Remember to listen to the people you have had around you up to now and just stay calm and you will get there. If you don’t get there this year, you will get there in the future. You’re 19 years old, kid. Do not try to change life.”

Mercedes have been working hard to shield their driver from the increased interest in his performances. While team principal Toto Wolff said in Miami that managing internal expectation has been the easy part, the “bigger problem”, as he put it, has been the hype coming out of Antonelli’s homeland.

“Now that [Italy] are not qualifying for the football [World Cup] it is all about [tennis champion Jannik] Sinner and Antonelli. I think Sinner won in Madrid, so it’s the two superstars and that is something that we need to contain. We just really need to stay calm here because such success for such a young man at this stage, all of Italy will be on him.”

Steiner agrees with his former fellow team boss that Antonelli’s best chance of pulling off something special this year means shutting out as much of that external noise as possible. He added: “I think his biggest danger is getting distracted by some of the things like, ‘I need to win this’, or by putting pressure on himself by listening to what other people tell him what he should be doing.

“He should be listening to the people he has around him, because they’ve done a good job with him and he has done a good job listening to them. So just block out certain surroundings like the media and don’t let that get to you and just stay calm. The biggest issue for him is getting impatient, him thinking he needs to win and show everyone who I am. That is the thing that could get him.

“And he showed that, I think it was when he crashed in practice a while back. He went there and he had a big crash because he was a little bit too impatient. He can’t fall back into that mindset. He must learn from that. Even if you lose out against George Russell, George is a good driver, so don’t worry, you’re still good even if you lose to George.

“But you’re 19 and George has got a lot of experience. Just live. Live in what has happened to you and listen to Toto and to your father.”