{"id":302828,"date":"2025-07-30T03:00:11","date_gmt":"2025-07-30T03:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/302828\/"},"modified":"2025-07-30T03:00:11","modified_gmt":"2025-07-30T03:00:11","slug":"has-mercedes-made-a-major-error-with-protected-species-kimi-antonelli","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/302828\/","title":{"rendered":"Has Mercedes made a major error with ‘protected species’ Kimi Antonelli?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kimi Antonelli is \u201clucky\u201d that he is a \u201cprotected species\u201d at Mercedes and free of danger over his career, unlike if he was a \u201cRed Bull youngster\u201d.<\/strong><\/p>\n

That is the claim made by respected F1 driver turned pundit Martin Brundle, but with Antonelli suffering a \u201ctorrid\u201d time in the Mercedes<\/a> W16, Brundle cannot understand why Mercedes overlooked the George Russell blueprint and put Antonelli straight in one of their seats.<\/p>\n

Kimi Antonelli: Mercedes F1 career too much too soon?<\/p>\n

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher<\/p>\n

After storming to the Italian Formula 4 title, and following that up with the Formula Regional European and Middle East crowns, Mercedes fast-tracked Antonelli to Formula 2 and, despite mixed results, settled on the Italian teenager as Lewis Hamilton\u2019s F1 2025 replacement.<\/p>\n

His rookie season got off to a strong start, with consistent top 10 finishes as experienced team-mate George Russell hoovered up podium results, but Antonelli has scored points just once in his last seven grands prix, having made the podium for the first time in Canada.<\/p>\n

Crossing the line P16 only last time out in Belgian,\u00a0Brundle feels Antonelli desperately needs the summer break which comes after this weekend\u2019s Hungarian Grand Prix.<\/p>\n

However, Brundle also believes Antonelli is in a \u201clucky\u201d situation at Mercedes, one which takes the pressure off his seat, even if he believes it is mounting for the 18-year-old Italian.<\/p>\n

\u201cKimi Antonelli is having a torrid time in the sister Merc,\u201d Brundle wrote in his Sky Sports column<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s only scored points once in the last seven GPs and it\u2019s not too difficult to observe that he\u2019s really feeling that pressure on his very young shoulders.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s lucky because he\u2019s effectively a protected species at the team and won\u2019t be living in fear of his career like a Red Bull youngster, but the summer break can\u2019t come early enough for him I suspect.\u201d<\/p>\n

At this point, Brundle warns Mercedes cannot let Antonelli\u2019s \u201chead spiral\u201d, and suggested that starting his F1 career in a Mercedes was a major error from the team.<\/p>\n

Russell, like Antonelli, was a graduate of the Mercedes Junior Team, though it was only after three seasons with Williams that he was promoted to Mercedes.<\/p>\n

\u201cI still wonder why they didn\u2019t give Kimi a couple of years to learn his trade in a lesser spotlight as they did with George Russell,\u201d Brundle continued.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s a generational talent as my Sky colleague Nico Rosberg would say, but they can\u2019t let his head spiral.\u201d<\/p>\n

Latest F1 2025 head-to-head standings<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udc49 F1 2025: Head-to-head qualifying statistics between team-mates<\/a><\/p>\n

\ud83d\udc49 F1 2025: Head-to-head race statistics between team-mates<\/a><\/p>\n

For Antonelli, it is clear in his mind how he can make life easier for himself.<\/p>\n

\u201cI shouldn\u2019t be starting that far back,\u201d Antonelli told the media, including PlanetF1.com, after finishing sixteenth from a pit-lane start in Belgium, having originally qualified eighteenth.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think I need to work on my qualifying, and work to get the confidence back with the car and in order to start more at the front. Because when you start at the front, it\u2019s a completely different race.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read next: The truth behind Mercedes meeting after Russell\u2019s \u2018worst performance\u2019 claim<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kimi Antonelli is \u201clucky\u201d that he is a \u201cprotected species\u201d at Mercedes and free of danger over his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":302829,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4103],"tags":[4199,707,4200,225,35357,5267,4859,12,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-302828","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-f1","8":"tag-f1","9":"tag-formula-1","10":"tag-formula1","11":"tag-home-page","12":"tag-kimi-antonelli","13":"tag-martin-brundle","14":"tag-mercedes","15":"tag-news","16":"tag-sports","17":"tag-uk","18":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114939955021347605","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302828","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=302828"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302828\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/302829"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=302828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=302828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=302828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}