After Lewis Hamilton announced his intention to join Ferrari, Toto Wolff announced a youthful driver lineup for the 2025 campaign.
According to Toto Wolff, Mercedes signed Kimi Antonelli right away in order to prevent him from picking up new “behaviors” at Williams. At the beginning of the 2025 season, the dynamic young rookie will take Lewis Hamilton’s seat at Ferrari.
In August, Mercedes said that Antonelli will receive a promotion as a member of their new driver roster. George Russell and the 18-year-old will play in a younger lineup, with Hamilton, 39, moving on.
Russell’s Formula One career began with Williams until he moved on to Mercedes in 2022. But Wolff has pushed Antonelli into Mercedes quickly in order to prevent the child from picking up undesirable habits elsewhere.
With Lewis’s departure, Wolff said Autosprint, “it’s time to make a generational shift because nothing will be the same as it was before.”
Next year, we’ll be managing a youthful squad. We are starting a new chapter with the arrival of George and Antonelli for the season. It’s time to flip the page and start over; the past period was fantastic.
“You want Antonelli to be fresh, untarnished, if you will, by outside experiences, which is why he is driving for Mercedes right now rather than making his debut at Williams.”
“He would learn other things, exhibit different behaviors, and have different ideas about technical stuff than us if he joined another team before us. That’s what we want to stay away from. It only makes sense, in my opinion, to have a young driver with you from the start.
Only a few hours after his deal was confirmed, Antonelli had a challenging Formula One debut. He spun the W15 into one of the barriers at Monza during the Italian Grand Prix while driving.
“First FP1 done,” Antonelli posted on social media with a video message to his followers. “Unfortunately it ended quite quickly because of the crash.
“It weighed around 52g, so it was rather large. I apologize to George and the crew for forcing them to work thereafter. It was simply an error on my part; I should have built the run a little more gradually and pushed a little too hard given the circumstances.
Mercedes has had trouble being consistent lately, but earlier this year they managed to give Hamilton his first race victory in two years. The Great British Grand Prix was won by the seven-time world champion, who then triumphed again in Belgium.