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Mercedes knew they were taking an almighty gamble by picking teenager Kimi Antonelli to replace seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton in 2025.
The Italian had a hugely impressive junior career, winning multiple titles while being backed by Mercedes as their academy prospect. He moved up to F2 in 2024, finishing sixth in his debut season.
Despite finishing over 100 points behind champion Gabriel Bortoleto and winning just two races all season, Mercedes trusted him to jump straight into F1 and replace Hamilton. Immediately, huge expectation was placed on him.
Are Mercedes already the team to beat after Antonelli and Russell topped Day 3 in Barcelona? 🤔
Antonelli was not thinking about Hamilton heading into his debut season, as he was merely focused on himself. He had racked up extensive mileage in private tests before 2025 and had the right support network around him, including Toto Wolff and Valtteri Bottas.
After a strong start to the season, Antonelli went on a torrid run when F1 went to Europe. Between round seven at Imola and round 16 at Monza, he scored points just three times, which led to speculation around his future.
Mercedes couldn’t ‘risk’ loaning out Kimi Antonelli after George Russell took too long to adapt from Williams
At the midway point of the season, Mercedes were pushing to sign Max Verstappen as he faced uncertainty around his future at Red Bull. Given his poor form, it was rumoured that Antonelli would be moved aside for the Dutchman.
But the team opted against it, as Gwen Lagrue, the head of Mercedes’ junior programme, had seen what had happened to Antonelli’s teammate, George Russell.
The Brit spent his first three seasons in F1 with Williams before moving up to Mercedes in 2022. As Lagrue noted on Chequered Flag, it took ‘half a season’ for Russell to adapt to the team, and it would have taken longer for Antonelli had they not promoted him in 2025.
“Of course, for an 18-year-old kid, becoming [a] Mercedes F1 driver, the pressure was probably higher,” he said.
Toto Wolff believes Kimi Antonelli can become an F1 champion. Is he wrong?
“But we have also put him in knowing that we were not probably going to fight for the title this year and it was maybe the best opportunity for us to take a risk by promoting Kimi straight away into our car and not putting him in a smaller team.
“We had also previously this experience with George because we had him for three years at Williams, and when he moved to Mercedes, it still took us half a season to get him up to speed.
“So we knew that if we didn’t take the opportunity to promote Kimi in 2025, then we wouldn’t have him until maybe ‘27, ‘28. We took this risk with the clear goal to make him ready for the fight, hopefully in ‘25, but more surely in ‘26.”
READ MORE: Everything you need to know about Mercedes F1 driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli
Mercedes did have plans to loan out Kimi Antonelli if they signed Max Verstappen
Verstappen committed to staying at Red Bull, leaving Wolff to retain his current crop of drivers for 2026. But there was a plan in place for Antonelli if a deal had been struck with the Red Bull star.
There were whispers that Antonelli would join Alpine on loan if Verstappen joined Mercedes. The Enstone outfit are becoming a customer team of the German manufacturer in 2026.
Alpine agreed to take Antonelli on a two-year deal, but that plan was scuppered after Verstappen told Red Bull he would be staying. Flavio Briatore’s team retained Pierre Gasly and Franco Colapinto for 2026.
Williams refused to take Antonelli on loan, as they no longer see themselves as minnows and a team that others can use to develop their own talent.
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