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On Oct. 26, Kimi Antonelli admitted that he approached his return to the wheel of a Mercedes in Mexico on Friday with caution.
The 18-year-old, who is set to succeed Lewis Hamilton at Ferrari in 2025, had a mishap during his official practice debut at Monza where he crashed George Russell’s 2024 car. However, this time in Mexico, Antonelli was driving Hamilton’s F1 single-seater.
When asked if he was concerned about Antonelli crashing his car as well, seven-time world champion Hamilton said on Thursday: “I don’t personally feel that. Kimi is young, and he’s learned from that first outing. We did our briefing together here, because he’s working with Bono next year, and I said to him ‘You don’t have to set the world alight on the first lap’. Just build into it – enjoy. I told him the track is really dirty early on.”
Although Antonelli’s pace was affected by debris damage to the floor, he managed to complete 19 laps – albeit over a second slower than Russell’s leading pace in the sister Mercedes.
“I didn’t want to take any risks,” Antonelli said. “I took it easy. We had a program to do with the team, and I didn’t want to make mistakes like in Monza. I felt I had margin, but there was no need to push. I’m happy. I gained experience. That’s what I wanted to do.”
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