The 'garage-born' boy who started racing on his father's lap
At 19, Kimi Antonelli dominates the F1 championship, and his story begins at age 10, 320 km/h, and a Lamborghini at the Adria circuit.
At 19, Kimi Antonelli dominates the F1 championship, and his story begins at age 10, 320 km/h, and a Lamborghini at the Adria circuit.
Kimi Antonelli was 10 years old when his father Marco first realized that the boy sitting on his lap, handling the steering wheel and gearshift, possessed an exceptional talent for racing. They were at the Adria circuit in northeastern Italy, Marco with his Lamborghini sports team, and Kimi was competing in a karting race. At the end of the day, Marco, himself a former driver, asked his son if he wanted to try the Lamborghini.
The father was in charge of the throttle and brakes, while Kimi controlled everything else. "I couldn't see the track because he was in front of me with his helmet. I could only see the markers beside me before each corner - 100m, 50m," Marco Antonelli told BBC Sport. They went faster and faster, and at the end of the straight they reached 320 km/h. The car had plenty of oversteer, and Kimi handled it perfectly.
Marco initially told his son to stop because it had become dangerous, but when he looked at the footage, he changed his mind. "But when I saw the video, 10 years old, on my leg, oversteer, everything perfect, I said: 'Maybe there's something special here,'" he recalled. Today, 19-year-old Kimi dominates this year's F1 championship in just his second season.
Marco Antonelli originally did not want his son to become a racing driver due to his own career struggles. In the 1990s, he was on the verge of becoming a factory driver in the DTM, then an extremely popular series. He tested for Alfa Romeo, but the team boss left and the opportunity fell through. A second chance came with BMW, alongside stars like Roberto Ravaglia and Steve Soper, but the same situation repeated. "I suffered a lot because of that. And, of course, I was afraid that my son would go through the same situation," Marco said.
Kimi first tried karting at age five and immediately showed awareness of racing lines, braking points, and car control. The Antonelli family was, as Marco puts it, a "normal family" that couldn't afford to fund all the categories on the road to Formula 1. Marco planned to finance Kimi through karting and a year of Formula 4, then perhaps place him in one of his GT cars. But Kimi immediately began impressing and winning in every category he entered.
Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff was already thinking of Antonelli as his next F1 driver, a potential replacement for Lewis Hamilton. When it came time to negotiate a new contract with the seven-time champion in 2023, Wolff played hardball. Hamilton wanted at least two years, Wolff only one. They eventually compromised on a deal for 2024 with an option for 2025.
Hamilton, unimpressed, decided to explore his options and signed for Ferrari for 2025, informing Wolff of this at the end of January 2024. Wolff immediately called Marco Antonelli with "very big news" and told him they were putting Kimi in Formula 1. Marco was happy but asked if Wolff was sure Kimi was ready.
Andrew Shovlin, Mercedes' director of track engineering, recalled the decision: "We were all eager to go with Kimi, which we knew was a bit of a risk. But it was quite exciting, and we thought, based on his career so far, that he had a good chance of being very good. It seemed like a good challenge." At that point, Antonelli hadn't even driven an F1 car. Mercedes arranged a testing program with about 20 days in cars several years old at tracks around the world.
Antonelli had his first F1 weekend at the Italian Grand Prix in Monza in 2024. Wolff gave him the opportunity in the first free practice session at his home race. He set the fastest time on his first lap, then on his next attempt, he crashed heavily at the final corner, Parabolica. "No one on earth could have gone through that corner at the speed he was trying. It was clear he had it in his head that he was going to try to do something special, and it was a misjudgment," Shovlin explained.
Wolff publicly managed expectations before Antonelli's debut season in 2025. "I conditioned myself so much that I said: 'There will be moments of brilliance and moments when you'll want to tear your hair out,'" Wolff told BBC Sport. There were standout moments, like out-qualifying George Russell on the street circuit in Jeddah and a sprint pole in Miami, but the mid-season stretch through Europe was disappointing. A change in rear suspension design made the car nervous and shook his confidence.
Shovlin admitted: "We expected more highs from him." Marco Antonelli explained the pressure: "Mercedes needed a good result after a period that wasn't like the Hamilton era. And, of course, they needed two cars that always scored points. Kimi felt that need. The crash in Monza was very hard for him to forget. It created a lot of pressure on him."
Wolff said the "moments of brilliance were there," but that a run of nine races followed that "really wasn't good." "Personally, I never doubted. Others did. In the team and from the outside," Wolff emphasized. A year after his debut, Antonelli crashed again in Monza during practice. "This was the point where I said: 'Kimi, you have to turn this around. This just isn't good enough.' He said: 'I know,'" Wolff recounted.
After F1 left Europe in the autumn of 2025, there was a shift. "Suddenly we felt that we were really making good progress," Shovlin said. Marco Antonelli added: "The period was bad, but you see the light at the end of the tunnel. And step by step, he started to gain confidence."
This season, Antonelli has taken the championship by the scruff of the neck. In the best car on the grid, he has taken six pole positions and six wins in 11 races and enters the second half of the season, which begins with the Dutch Grand Prix, with a 50-point lead in the drivers' standings. Had it not been for reliability issues, he could be even further ahead.
Wolff admitted that everyone was surprised by the scale of the turnaround. "My thoughts were always that he needed to experience knowing all the tracks, the pressure of performing at such a high level under the media spotlight, constant public feedback, whether you're doing well or not, situations where everyone wanted to be close to him," he said. Max Verstappen also praised the young Italian: "For me, there was never any doubt that he would make a step forward the next year and already be much more consistently competitive. That's normal in a driver's progression. In your rookie season, it can be quite tough, but at the moment, of course, he's doing an incredible job."
Kimi describes his father as his "rock," and Wolff praises the "typical Italian family." "They are caring, loving. Kimi's character is gentle, he has empathy, charisma, he has the right amount of intelligence for a racing driver," Wolff said. Mercedes has talked to Antonelli about managing emotions, which have occasionally flared up, like in the Canada sprint when the battle between the two Mercedes drivers was close to boiling over. Shovlin relayed Antonelli's reaction: "He just says: 'I'm young, I'm Italian, what do you expect?'"
Wolff, however, sees a different picture: "He has all that. He's actually not a typical emotional Italian. He's so clear about what needs to be done in the car. I don't see much emotion. I see full focus, full concentration. I see: 'OK, this is a problem, let's analyze it and move on.'"
Antonelli also sought advice on emotional control from tennis legend Roger Federer, whom he met at Wimbledon this summer. "We talked about my races. About how he played, and about life in general. About pressure, he just told me to focus on one race at a time, to focus on what I can control, and also to control emotions, especially those that can lead to mistakes," Kimi said.
Federer's words echoed what Marco has always instilled in his son. "In our family, we use this concept in normal life too. We have to live every day as our best day. You work hard every day to reach the end of the project you have," Marco said. The project, according to him, was clear: "Toto said: 'Of course it will be tough, but I think after a year of experience, we can do very well with Kimi in F1.' The project was gaining experience in 2025, starting to deliver results in 2026. I think we have exceeded expectations."
