F1 News
Antonelli, 'like Verstappen and Hamilton': "Mercedes raving about him"
In his first ever Formula 1 Grand Prix, Mercedes driver Kimi Antonelli impressed with his drive from P16 to P4 in the challenging conditions in Melbourne. Being given a top seat at Mercedes in his rookie season, expectations are high for the young driver. But is he a generational talent?
Marc Priestley, former mechanic at McLaren, discussed on the Track Limits podcast Antonelli as a possible generational talent, and how excited Mercedes are to work with him. "More than that. I’ve got a lot of friends at Mercedes, I speak to people that have worked with him in testing and they’re raving about him as being a sort of generational talent. That doesn’t happen very often."
He then went on to compare Antonelli with two of the World Champions on the grid, saying, "That’s the Max Vertappens of this world, the Lewis Hamiltons, the people that stand out really early on to the engineers of this business."
Mercedes 'very excited' to work with Antonelli
Priestley shared the different insights the teams get from working with a driver one-on-one, as opposed to the limited information fans get. "When you work with a driver, you get a completely different perception of what they’re like. Fans only can ever judge on the race results and the points scored and all these things, which is fair because that’s all you ever get to see."
"When you work with somebody up close and personal in a team, you see a completely different side, and the people at Mercedes have a very different perspective and they’re very excited," Priestley concluded.
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