Emotional Antonelli ends 20-year wait for Italian F1 winner

Kimi Antonelli admits he was on the verge of tears as he achieved a dream first victory at the Chinese Grand Prix.

The Mercedes driver became the second-youngest driver to ever win a grand prix – after Max Verstappen – and also gave Italy its first winner in 20 years, dating back to Giancarlo Fisichella in March 2006. Antonelli was emotional post-race, admitting he feared he had jeopardized his comfortable lead with a late lock-up that damaged his tires.

“I’m speechless, I’m about to cry, to be honest,” Antonelli said. “But yeah, thank you so much to my team because they helped me to achieve this dream.

“I’m super happy. I said yesterday that I really wanted to bring Italy back on top, and we did today. Even though I gave myself a little bit of a heart attack towards the end with a flat spot, it was a good race.”

Antonelli’s father Marco was in the Mercedes garage to see his son secure his first race victory, and the winner was joined on the podium by race engineer Peter Bonnington – two people he singled out as key influences in his early success in F1.

“It’s been great to have also my dad here, to share this moment with him because he’s been part of this whole journey since karting,” said the Mercedes driver. “Also, with Bono and Toto [Wolff] – Toto took me in the team in 2018 and brought me all the way to Formula 1. He gave me the opportunity last year to put me in the car, and then again, this year.

“So definitely it’s been a great journey so far. But of course, there’s still a long way, but we’re on a good path and I’ve been enjoying a lot the time with Mercedes, with the whole team. Just looking forward to the future.”

Despite the elation of his first win, Antonelli was still self-critical of his initial race start, having been overtaken by Lewis Hamilton around the outside of the first corner.

“The start is still our weak point and to be fair I didn’t go with great confidence because my two previous starts were really bad, so I didn’t know what to expect,” he said. “But obviously, I covered a little bit too much on the inside and left too much space on the outside, so probably need to review that.

“But the pace was still good, especially I felt good on the hard tires, even though at the end I relaxed a bit too much and did a mistake which put a bit of pressure. But [I] still managed to bring it home.”