Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff described Kimi Antonelli’s performance at the Italian Grand Prix as “underwhelming” and believes his driver needs to free himself from previous mistakes.
Antonelli spun into the gravel during Friday’s second practice session at Monza, losing long run data at a key point of the weekend. While he qualified just behind teammate George Russell, Antonelli then picked up a penalty for forcing Alex Albon off track and was warned over track limits violations as he was classified over 20 seconds behind Russell in ninth place.
“Underwhelming this weekend, underwhelming,” Wolff said. “You can’t put the car in the gravel bed and expect to be there. All of the race was underwhelming.
“It doesn’t change anything in terms of my support and confidence in his future because I believe he’s going to be very, very, very good. But [Monza] was… underwhelming.”
Wolff believes Antonelli is getting held back by some of the other mistakes he has made in his rookie season, pointing to it taking him six laps to pass Pierre Gasly after his pit stop perhaps being a hangover from his collision with Charles Leclerc in Zandvoort a week earlier.
“I think a clean weekend means almost not to carry too much trauma of previous mistakes into the next session or into the next weekend, because that is luggage,” Wolff said. “You’re not going to attack the corner hard if you’ve been off there before [in a previous] session, or maybe you’re not attacking a driver that should not be in your way like Gasly because we had this situation with Leclerc. He shouldn’t lose even a second on Gasly.”
With Antonelli still struggling for consistency despite Mercedes making progress with its rear suspension – an area that was proving troublesome for the the drivers – Wolff believes the Italian rookie needs more confidence to perform at a higher level.
“Just freeing him up [is key],” Wolff said. “He’s a great driver, has this unbelievable ability and natural talent. He’s a race driver – it’s all there. But we need to get rid of the ballast.”
