Formula 1
Antonelli: "I don't know if I will be ready" for F1
Antonelli has been long linked to replace Hamilton at Mercedes in 2025
Sam Hall
Edited: Jul 21, 2024, 12:14 PM
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Andrea Kimi Antonelli, Prema Racing
Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images
Andrea Kimi Antonelli says he is unsure if he is ready to make the jump to Formula 1 yet despite scoring his second F2 win in Hungary.
Antonelli scored his first F2 win of the season in wet conditions at Silverstone a fortnight ago, and backed this up with his maiden feature race success in Hungary on Sunday.
This latest success owed a significant amount to a fortuitous late safety car that allowed him to complete his mandatory stop and switch to soft tyres without losing too many places, the Italian dropping to fifth and quickly recovering to the lead.
Although this will be seen by some as confirmation that Mercedes should hire the 17-year-old as seven-time Formula 1 champion Lewis Hamilton's replacement, the driver himself is less certain.
With his Prema team-mate Oliver Bearman already confirmed as a Haas driver for 2025, Antonelli was asked if his consistent ability to outperform the Briton gave him confidence that he too is now ready for F1
He replied: "I don't know if I will be ready, to be honest. I'm still learning a lot in F2.
"I definitely still make a lot of mistakes and the details that really matter, I'm still not doing everything right. I just want to be honest."
A look at Antonelli's results backs his sentiment, with the Silverstone win coming off the back of a four-race streak without a point.
Andrea Kimi Antonelli, Prema Racing
Photo by: Prema Powerteam
And even in Saturday's sprint race, Antonelli conceded to pushing too hard on the soft tyres while leading, something that forced him to pit and drop to 14th.
"On Saturday, I made a bit of a mistake in Turn 1," he explained. "I made a bit of a lockup and flat-spotted the tyres and, despite knowing that, I kept pushing on the tyre and I degraded a lot eventually and had to pit.
"But that definitely was a good lesson for the feature race. There is still some work to do but we are moving in the right direction."
Rumours about Antonelli's immediate future meant he entered F2 under significant pressure before turning a wheel, with Hamilton's pre-season announcement catapulting his name into the headlines.
Commenting on how his recent success has eased this buildup, Antonelli said: "From Silverstone, I feel way lighter – there's quite a bit less pressure on my shoulders.
"The pressure was building up weekend by weekend, obviously, with all of the talking. Silverstone was a big relief for me and I think this weekend I was driving more freely than previous weekends, I was driving way more naturally without really thinking about the outcome, just focusing on myself and I think it really showed.
"Even this win, a feature race in the dry, is a big relief and a big result for all of us."
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