Kimi

⁠Kimi Antonelli has become Formula One’s youngest world champion ⁠at 20 years and 68 days old with his third-place finish for Mercedes at the Mexico City Grand Prix.

The first Italian champion since 1953 sobbed with joy over the team radio as he took the chequered flag at the high-altitude Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez on Sunday.

Red Bull’s Max Verstappen won the red-flagged, restarted race for his second win of the season, but Antonelli’s overall lead ⁠reached an unassailable 119 points after finishing third.

Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton started from pole position and took a close second place – after clashing with teammate Charles Leclerc – on an afternoon of drama, with two safety cars, multiple crashes and an agonising 33-minute halt with 25 of the 71 laps remaining.

“Get in there, Kimi. Champion of the world,” said his race engineer Peter Bonnington, a regular target for the young driver’s practical jokes.

“We did it. Thank you so much,” ⁠gasped the Italian, whose parents and sister were there to embrace him when he stepped out of the car. He was then mobbed by his pit crew.

The previous youngest champion was Germany’s Sebastian Vettel, who took the first of his four with Red Bull at 23 years and 134 days old in 2010.

“I’m speechless. I’m trying to process what has just happened,” Antonelli said to the crowd.

“It’s been an incredible season, and to share this podium with Max and Lewis is truly incredible. And looking forward to some more battles in the future.

“This weekend, I did feel a bit more tense, but I’m just so happy that we got it done, and now ‌we can enjoy the rest of the season,” he added, as he stood on the podium with an Italian flag wrapped around his shoulders, spraying the champagne with abandon.

The last Italian champion was Alberto Ascari, 73 years earlier.

“On the last lap, I just backed off, because I just couldn’t see the track. I was getting emotional,” Antonelli told a later news conference.

“So it was just good to bring it home.”

Verstappen second in drivers’ standings

Leclerc finished fourth, McLaren’s outgoing champion Lando Norris fifth, and Antonelli’s teammate George Russell only sixth in a race he had to win to have any chance of staying in contention.

That also meant that Verstappen went second in the overall standings, with Hamilton third and preseason favourite Russell plummeting to fourth, 130 points behind Antonelli.

Mercedes have 630 points in the constructors’ standings to Ferrari’s 504 and could clinch that title in Brazil next weekend.

The race was stopped after a brief safety car deployment on lap 46 of 71 after Valtteri Bottas suffered a high-speed front-left suspension failure down the straight, with his Cadillac pitching uncontrollably into the barriers at turn one.

Bottas received medical attention in the car, but then walked to an ambulance, giving a thumbs-⁠up, as the rest of the field returned to the pits. He went to the medical centre and was released.

Verstappen led from the restart, challenged by Hamilton, with Antonelli passing Leclerc. There was then another safety car when Lindblad and Piastri collided, with the field released to race again with nine laps to the ⁠chequered flag.

‘Pushed out by ‌my own teammate’

Hamilton had led away from the original pole position for the 105th time in his career, but the first for Ferrari at a full Grand Prix, with Leclerc slotting in behind from third on the grid.

The British driver held him off as they went side by side through the opening corners, but Leclerc cut turn four and went across the grass as they battled for the lead, with Verstappen then taking second from Hamilton as the Ferrari looped wide.

“Pushed out by ‌my own teammate,” Hamilton said over the radio.

The stewards handed Leclerc a five-second penalty, but that did little for Hamilton, who remained behind his teammate after their respective stops on laps 28 and 29, with the Monegasque taking his penalty.

Russell, who had lined up on the front row, made a poor start and dropped to fifth. He also collided with Hadjar, punting the Red Bull off, and the stewards handed him a 10-second penalty.

Hamilton said his pole, on his 43rd start for Ferrari, was “one of the greatest feelings”.

It is not the first time he has qualified fastest for Ferrari – that was when he took sprint pole at the Chinese Grand Prix last year, in only his second race for the team.

But that was followed by a difficult debut season, when he looked a shadow of his former self, and was pretty much taken to the cleaners by Leclerc.

Hamilton’s record is such that his performances last year left many perplexed – not least himself. He was consistently down on himself, even saying at one low point in the summer of 2025 that he was “just useless” and suggesting Ferrari should change drivers.

As this followed a similarly challenging final year for Mercedes, it inevitably led to questions about his future, whether age was catching up with him. After all, he had no explanations for his performances himself.

His form has improved this year, with a car that he finds much more to his liking, and he has a number of times referenced these perfectly valid questions. He did so again on Saturday.

“It’s impossible to rank 105 pole positions,” he said. “They have all been unique in their own way. It feels more special in this period where they’re not every week and it’s the first one with Ferrari in red.

“I’ve now had pole with three different teams, which is pretty phenomenal. And all the questions people had about whether a 40-year-old has still got it, there you go.”

The battle between Hamilton and Leclerc has been much more even this year.

Hamilton leads his team-mate by eight points in the championship and in qualifying there is nothing to choose between them – it is now 12-10 in their head-to-head and Leclerc is ahead on average pace by just 0.037secs, when the gap was 0.15secs last year.

“I have been fortunate to have many great experiences with Mercedes over the years,” said Hamilton. “We have had sprint pole but I have been really dreaming and eyeing for that first pole with the team.

“Charles is very, very quick over one lap. He has had an engineer he has worked with for years. It’s an environment he is very aware of and used to.

“I am still settling in and learning, with new engineers this year. We have really found a good rapport and are really doing a great job. There is lots more to come, we just have to keep on at it, but what an amazing feeling to get that first.”

Hamilton goes into the race with less knowledge than his rivals, a breakdown in second practice meaning he was not able to do his race-simulation run.

“It will will be a massive challenge to find the right balance but I am hopeful, it will be challenging and tough,” he said.

Championship leader Kimi Antonelli sealed his ninth victory of the season with victory at the United States Grand Prix in Austin.

Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc was second and Red Bull’s Max Verstappen third.

Mercedes’ Antonelli, 20, can become the youngest world champion in Formula 1 history if he finishes ninth or higher at the Mexico City Grand Prix next weekend.

Here are my ratings for how the drivers performed across the whole weekend in Texas.

Kimi Antonelli – 10/10

A superb weekend under the added pressure of having his first opportunity to seal the championship. Produced an outstanding lap for pole and then controlled the race beautifully, making the one-stop work while many around him needed two.

Charles Leclerc – 9.5/10

Very close to a perfect weekend himself. Fastest in both Friday practice sessions, qualified fourth and then raced brilliantly in his Ferrari to second, including late passes on Lando Norris and Max Verstappen.

Max Verstappen – 8.5/10

Quick all weekend and put the Red Bull on the front row, but the poor start immediately made his race more difficult. Recovered well despite problems with the car and still came away with a sixth consecutive podium.

Lewis Hamilton – 7.5/10

Another strong weekend but behind team-mate Leclerc for the majority of it. Fastest in final practice, only narrowly behind Leclerc in qualifying and fought his way back to fourth after Ferrari committed to the two-stop strategy.

Lando Norris – 8/10

Recovered well from eighth on the grid but qualifying should have been better as his quickest Q3 lap was deleted for track limits. McLaren’s decision to leave him out on ageing tyres cost him late on, so fifth was not entirely of his own making.

Isack Hadjar – 8.5/10

An excellent turnaround after struggling badly with the Red Bull during practice. Qualified a superb third, ran strongly in the race and eventually finished sixth despite throttle mapping problems and moving aside for team-mate Verstappen.

Oscar Piastri – 6.5/10

A fairly subdued weekend by the McLaren man’s standards. Seventh in qualifying and seventh in the race, although the first-lap battle with George Russell went against him and the stewards decided the Mercedes driver was at fault.

George Russell – 5.5/10

A disappointing weekend given what the other Mercedes achieved. Admitted both of his Q3 laps were poor and then picked up a five-second time penalty for leaving the track and gaining an advantage in his battle with Piastri, eventually finishing eighth.

Liam Lawson – 8/10

Another quietly excellent weekend from Lawson. Racing Bulls sacrificed a proper Q3 attempt to preserve tyres for Sunday and he converted ninth on the grid into ninth at the finish to score again.

Pierre Gasly – 8/10

Probably extracted just about everything available from the Alpine. Missed Q3 but fought his way back into the points after an early dice with Haas’ Oliver Bearman.

He came into the weekend insisting he was going to try to apply the “same mindset as I had all year – one race at a time”.

But on Saturday he acknowledged that this one was a new kind of weekend.

“It does feel a little bit different,” he said. “But the goal stays the same. I just need to keep doing my job. And, actually, I feel like I can enjoy more driving, everything.

“But, of course, we’re going to do the race tomorrow. We’re going to try and win. And then we’ll see what happens. Obviously, I’m in a very good position.”

Antonelli is typically accompanied by his father, Marco, at grands prix, but he said this weekend he had brought other people with him as well to help keep him in the right frame of mind.

“I have a great group of people around me,” he said. “I have a lot of friends here as well, so we enjoy the evenings together.

“We play cards in the evening, so we’re just doing the fun stuff. And that’s what helps, to just relax a little bit and just connect with the mind, and then once you go on track you are back full focus.”

The maths suggest the most likely scenario is that Antonelli will not win the title on Sunday – it would, as he put it on Thursday, require “something catastrophic to happen to the others”.

If this is a bit of an overstatement – Russell and Hamilton would need only to crash together on the first lap, for example – the fundamental truth is real.

Kimi Antonelli took pole position for the United States Grand Prix on the weekend on which he can potentially clinch his first world title.

The Mercedes driver beat Red Bull’s Max Verstappen by 0.179 seconds, with the Dutchman’s team-mate Isack Hadjar third ahead of Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton.

Antonelli whooped with delight as he took his first pole position since the Belgian Grand Prix in July and said: “It feels good to be back.”

The 20-year-old Italian will become world champion on Sunday if he wins the race in Austin with Hamilton lower than fourth and Russell lower than eighth.

Hamilton is already below that position having qualified fifth, while Russell will start sixth ahead of the McLarens of Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris.

Antonelli’s pole came as something of a surprise after the Ferraris had topped all three practice sessions and Verstappen had looked strong through the second part of qualifying.

“I wasn’t expecting that,” said Antonelli’s engineer Peter Bonnington, emphasising that his charge’s first lap in final qualifying was good enough for pole.

Verstappen had been fourth quickest in Q2 despite being on used tyres but he found his car lacked the requisite grip in the final session.

Antonelli said: “We got pole so we will try to win tomorrow but Max has been very quick and Isack did an incredible job so it is not going to be easy.

“We try to get a good start and hopefully lead into Turn One and try to set the pace, even though it’s going to be very tight.”

Verstappen said: “Q3 was not good, Q1, Q2 were nice but for whatever reason in run one and two just didn’t have a nice balance. No mistakes, just not enough grip. But if it’s still a P2, I take it.”

Ferrari have an upgrade on their car this weekend, focused on a new floor, but Leclerc was downplaying expectations.

“It felt good but it is not the gain I have seen or heard about,” Leclerc said. “It is small gains but we could still see them on the car. It is a small step forward and we started the weekend on the right foot with a good balance and that is the outstanding thing with this Friday.

“It has been a very clean Friday for me, but the others seem to be gaining more than us from Friday to Saturday and seeing the little gap there is, it is not going to be so easy tomorrow.”

Leclerc picked up on Verstappen’s complaints about the track surface on Thursday by saying: “It was very poor. The first sector is particularly poor and very bumpy.”

McLaren’s Lando Norris was seventh fastest, although the world champion did not set a time on his qualifying simulation run on soft tyres after making a mistake at Turn 16.

Norris was the fastest on the long runs, at about 0.2secs on average faster than Verstappen, but cannot be compared as he was running the hard tyre.

McLaren have introduced the first of three consecutive planned upgrades this weekend, but he was not happy with his performance.

“Difficult,” Norris said. “The pace is not bad. We seem a step away from Red Bull and Ferrari, probably Mercedes as well, but the car is very difficult to drive, too difficult to be consistent and get a nice feeling consistently.

“To get the car be quick we just have to try so hard to be perfect and you can’t be perfect. I am sure everyone has similar problems in a way but we are just not quick enough yet to be there consistently enough.”

McLaren’s Oscar Piastri was eighth quickest, ahead of Red Bull’s Isack Hadjar and Haas driver Oliver Bearman.