When Mercedes put sentiment to one side and made the rational decision to let Kimi Antonelli take a fifth Formula 1 power unit in his home race, landing him a back-of-the-grid start for exceeding his allowance for the year, it did so for a good reason.
With the strength of Mercedes’ 2026 power unit, and a freshly built example no less, Mercedes is expecting its young challenger to quickly move up the order on Monza’s long straights, limiting the damage to the 19-year-old’s title campaign.
Quite how far Antonelli can go on what has become a much tighter field is tough to predict, along with how much overtaking the energy-starved 2026 cars will produce. According to Aston Martin veteran Fernando Alonso, Mercedes certainly made the right call as he predicted a podium spot for Antonelli.
“Top three. There are a lot of straights, so it is good for him,” Alonso said ahead of the Monza weekend.
Friday practice offered little evidence to contradict the wily Spaniard, as Mercedes set the tone with George Russell leading FP2. But while McLaren looked like it was on the back foot, Ferrari’s improved power unit appears to throw a spanner in the works, as Antonelli would have to defeat at least one of Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton to join pre-event favourite Russell on the rostrum, while also overcoming the track position and estimated 20-second race-time loss associated with starting from the back.
Andrea Kimi Antonelli, Mercedes
Photo by: Andy Hone/ LAT Images via Getty Images
What Antonelli saw in practice, working on his race set-up while following the Ferraris around, didn’t inspire confidence.
“Ferrari definitely took a step forward with the new engine and now the speeds are the same,” Antonelli reported. “We know how good their car is in the corners, so for sure it’s going to be a tight fight for pole tomorrow [with Russell].
“It’s a track where you can do so many different things and it was interesting in the long run today, running behind other cars to see what they were doing differently, where they were deploying compared to us.”
Antonelli’s claim that the top speeds between Mercedes and Ferrari are the same doesn’t quite pass the GPS test, as in qualifying trim Russell’s Mercedes was noticeably up on the Ferraris across three of Monza’s four long straights, the gap sitting around an average of 5km/h.
“Straight-line speed, it’s considerable to worry about,” Hamilton said. “Just looking at the deltas just there, I was losing something like six tenths to George, just in the straights. Which is something we need to look into.”
The only straight where the tables were turned was the long run towards Parabolica, the final corner, where the Ferraris were 5-6km/h faster, a telltale sign of a different energy deployment strategy through the preceding Variante Ascari, the fast left-right-left combination.
Fernando Alonso predicted a podium finish for Kimi Antonelli
Photo by: Alex Bierens de Haan / Getty Images
When asked about Alonso’s podium prediction, Mercedes’ deputy team principal Bradley Lord said the Brackley squad would also be satisfied with a strong haul of points for Antonelli.
“If Fernando’s bet pays off and it pays out for him, then we’ll be very happy indeed,” Lord said. “I think we’re aiming to get up into solid points-paying positions. We saw George able to do that in Hungary after effectively starting from the back. Following this challenge he had off the start line, he was still able to get back up there.
“It’s hard to put too precise a prediction on it, just because you don’t know how the race will unfold, what virtual safety cars and safety cars might do. We’ve seen in the last few races we’ve been a little unlucky with VSCs, so maybe it’s time for the wheel to turn on that one and something to play into our hands as well.”
