Andrea Kimi Antonelli is undoubtedly one of the most exciting talents taking to the grid in 2025, as he replaces Lewis Hamilton at Mercedes.
The 18-year-old Italian has enjoyed a rapid rise up the motorsport ladder, having been successful in junior formula categories including Formula Regional European and impressed in his karting days.
Mercedes gave Kimi Antonelli his first taste of F1 machinery last year, putting him in their 2021 Constructors’ title-winning car first before giving him a test in a more up-to-date machine from 2022.
Kimi Antonelli would later be given a chance to run in FP1 at his home race at Monza, although it only lasted 10 minutes before he crashed after making a mistake at the Parabolica. Antonelli later brushed off the 52G impact, and apologised to his team for the embarrassing moment.
It’s no secret that Mercedes sees Kimi Antonelli as the next big thing in F1, but in an interview with Autosport, Mercedes driver development advisor Gwen Lagrue said there was one thing that he did during his Formula 2 season this year that really impressed the team.
Kimi Antonelli impressed Mercedes with ‘maturity’ during difficult F2 season
Kimi Antonelli’s F2 season was less of a success than anticipated, given he was racing for one of the best teams on the grid: Prema. The team had struggled to get on top of the new car, with Kimi Antonelli only finishing in sixth in his rookie season.
Lagrue, who was the main talent scout who spotted Kimi Antonelli during his karting days, says he impressed everyone at Mercedes with how he handled the tough situation.
“Prema was performing super well and had top engineers. We put Kimi in there thinking, we will put him in a very strong environment, and we will normally deliver strong results. And it appears that we struggled a little bit.
“But in a way, it was also very interesting because having Kimi dealing with such challenges made us discover part of him we haven’t seen before. We had to help him to deal with difficult weekends, which never happened before. He was used to winning all the time, or to fighting for the win, and this year was the first time actually he had to deal with not winning and not performing, and sometimes even have really, really tough weekends.
“And I have to say that I was very impressed with his maturity and his leadership in such a difficult situation. And at the end of the day, he has still done a very, very strong season in F2 considering all we had to deal with this year.”
Kimi Antonelli could break F1 record in first three races with Mercedes
Antonelli will be the youngest driver on the F1 grid this season, the third youngest driver in the 75-year history of the championship behind Lance Stroll and Max Verstappen.
When he makes his debut at the Australian Grand Prix in March he will be 18 years and 203 days old, which means he stands a chance of becoming F1’s youngest winner.
READ MORE: Know all about 2025 Mercedes F1 driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli including stats
This record was set by Verstappen at the 2016 Spanish Grand Prix on his debut for Red Bull, after both Mercedes drivers crashed on the opening lap.
Verstappen was only 18 years and 228 days old when he won, meaning Antonelli has at least 25 days to break the record if Mercedes provides him with a car capable of winning.
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