F1 Heads to Spa; Kimi Antonelli Doesn’t Mince Words

Although he remains firmly in first place in the Formula 1 World Championship standings—largely thanks to the points he accumulated in the first part of the season up to Monte Carlo— Kimi Antonelli is going through a rollercoaster period, with a few too many technical issues that have allowed his closest rivals—namely his teammate George Russell and Ferrari driver Lewis Hamilton—to close the gap significantly.

At the press conference on the eve of the Spa-Francorchamps weekend, which will culminate in the Belgian Grand Prix scheduled for Sunday, Antonelli did not mince words about what is happening and his prospects for this phase of the season. “At Silverstone, the pace was good, and that’s an important sign. As far as I’m concerned, the goal is simple: to bring home a result,” he said.

“The rest isn’t up to me, and I can’t control it,” the young driver from Bologna added. What happened at the end of the race was disappointing, of course, but that’s part of motorsport: there are external factors that sometimes affect you without you being able to avoid them. The team is working extraordinarily hard to ensure those problems don’t happen again. At Spa, we expect to be up front, even though Ferrari will be an opponent to keep an eye on.”

In the British Grand Prix, just as he was poised to overtake Charles Leclerc, Antonelli (winner of Saturday’s Sprint race) suffered damage to his car that forced him to make two pit stops and resulted in a penalty for cutting a corner (which he couldn’t avoid precisely because of steering difficulties). The safety car, which effectively ended the race, was the final blow: by bringing the field back together, the penalty forced him to finish in fifteenth place, thus preventing him from scoring any points in the standings.