The clever decision that was the foundation of Kimi Antonelli’s brilliant maiden win in China

What a weekend for Kimi Antonelli, who became Formula 1’s youngest ever polesitter on Saturday and backed it up with a very solid maiden win on Sunday to ignite a potential intra-team title battle in 2026.

So far this year I’ve felt that Kimi has been living in the shadows of George Russell at Mercedes. There’s no doubt that George has worked out how to maximise the performance of the car in this new complex era of Formula 1.