Kimi Antonelli showed relief and satisfaction after taking full advantage of Mercedes teammate George Russell\u2019s misfortunes to extend his lead in the drivers\u2019 championship with a calm win in the Belgian Grand Prix.<\/p>\n
His victory ended a three-race winless streak and lifted the Italian 50 points clear of the luckless Russell, who slipped to third in the title race after colliding with seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton\u2019s Ferrari on the opening lap.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt feels nice to be back on the top step after a few difficult races,\u201d the 19-year-old Antonelli said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a hard-fought race. We lost first place with the virtual safety car and then we managed to make our way back \u2014 and it was a tough win because Charles [Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc] was quick and we had to hold on to that.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe momentum was always there, so it was just about getting the result.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hamilton survived his clash with Russell to finish fourth on track behind second-placed teammate Leclerc and four-time champion Max Verstappen of Red Bull.<\/p>\n
Hamilton climbed to second in the championship, 45 points behind Antonelli.<\/p>\n
Antonelli admitted he had been fortunate to score maximum points on a day when Russell was forced to retire again.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were a bit lucky with what happened, in terms of the championship, but that is why you have to take every opportunity because we saw it can really swing the situation.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow, we just have to keep performing, keep bringing the results and then we will see what will happen at the end of the year.\u201d<\/p>\n
After reliability problems in Spain and Britain deprived him of any points, Antonelli had to stay calm under instruction from Mercedes to come home 1.9 seconds ahead of Leclerc.<\/p>\n
He recovered from losing his lead, after a good start from his pole position, during a virtual safety car intervention that favoured Ferrari and others.<\/p>\n
Leclerc, who won the last race at Silverstone, fought hard to stay in contention and took second place, which leaves him fourth in the title race, 78 points behind Antonelli.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believed in the win until the end. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe had a little bit of luck with the VSC at the right time for us, but the pace was relatively strong.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were five or six laps, on the hard [tyres], where I was struggling with the front axle, and then it came back a little bit.<\/p>\n
\u201cI felt better with the car. There\u2019s still some work to do, but it\u2019s a step forward.\u201d<\/p>\n
Verstappen said he and Antonelli had been unlucky with the VSC that gave Ferrari and others a \u201ccheap stop\u201d in the race.<\/p>\n
\u201cI tried everything I could in the race,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe first stint was not too bad; the second stint was probably a bit more difficult. <\/p>\n
\u201cBut at the same time, Kimi and I got a little bit unlucky with the virtual safety car.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor us, to be on the podium is good. I gave it everything I had, so actually P3 is good.\u201d \u2014 AFP<\/p>\n
The Herald<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kimi Antonelli showed relief and satisfaction after taking full advantage of Mercedes teammate George Russell\u2019s misfortunes to extend…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":29525,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4],"tags":[16278,7,15761,16141,4031,16281,16279,16140,9099,16205,16334,16335],"class_list":["post-29524","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-belgium","tag-belgian-grand-prix","tag-belgium","tag-charles-leclerc","tag-ferrari","tag-formula-1","tag-george-russell","tag-kimi-antonelli","tag-lewis-hamilton","tag-max-verstappen","tag-mercedes","tag-red-bull","tag-spa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@be\/116951828808825392","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29524","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29524"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29524\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29525"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29524"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29524"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29524"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}