McLaren have taken a big step forward and Mercedes no longer have the quickest car in Formula One, championship leader Kimi Antonelli said after the Dutch Grand Prix. McLaren’s reigning champion Lando Norris celebrated his second win in a row from pole position at Zandvoort on Sunday, with Antonelli and Mercedes teammate George Russell finishing second and third, ahead of Ferrari pair Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc. I think if I didn’t get Kimi when I overtook him, I don’t think I would have won the race,” he said.
Ferrari can be expected to go well at their home Grand Prix at Monza early next month, with upgrades in the pipeline, while Antonelli faces hefty grid penalties for an engine change. Mercedes are still way ahead of Ferrari and McLaren in the constructors’ championship and scored more points – 46 to McLaren’s 43 and Ferrari’s 31 – than anyone else over the weekend. It’s not like last year where we were pretty good everywhere,” said Norris.
No one matches us in high speed, and that’s a good thing. And therefore, I don’t have the confidence to say ‘yeah, I can easily fight for a championship for the rest of the season’.” “I know I’ve just won two races in a row and had two poles in a row, but at the minute I don’t have the car I need to fight for a championship,” added the Briton, who is 83 points behind Antonelli, with 11 rounds remaining unless the situation in the Middle East forces a calendar change. Mercedes boss Toto Wolff said cost cap restrictions meant Mercedes did not have the money to implement developments on the car as quickly as they might want.
I’m just pretty sure that they will have upgrades.” Antonelli, who turns 20 on Tuesday, faces another obstacle in his quest to become F1’s youngest-ever champion. He will need to take a hefty grid penalty at his home Italian Grand Prix in two weeks as Mercedes plan to swap his car’s power unit to head off potential reliability problems in the second half of the season. That will put Antonelli over his allowance of key components for the year.
Obviously, our algorithms don’t take the nationality into consideration,” Wolff said. He has accepted the decision.
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