(Motorsport-Total.com) – World Championship leader Kimi Antonelli starts the Austrian Grand Prix from fourth position after the Mercedes driver prematurely aborted his last attack on pole position. Antonelli mistakenly interpreted the yellow flag after Max Verstappen’s accident as a double yellow.
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Teammate George Russell did better because the third-placed driver in the championship briefly lifted before the danger spot but still secured the best time and thus pole for the race. “I was a tenth behind him [Russell], so it would have been the front row,” Antonelli laments. “But still not enough for pole.”
In fact, the Italian was slightly slower than his teammate, who needed 16.424 and 29.620 seconds in the first two sectors of his pole lap, while Antonelli had already incurred a deficit with 16.477 and 29.666 seconds, which would have been difficult to make up in the last sector.
Would Antonelli have been faster than Charles Leclerc?
But how does the comparison look with Charles Leclerc, who put his Ferrari on the second starting position for Sunday’s race? In the first sector, the two rivals were almost equal, as Leclerc needed 16.485 seconds, while Antonelli was only minimally faster with 16.477 seconds.
It was a millisecond duel that both drivers fought with slightly different techniques: Antonelli and Leclerc braked at exactly the same point on the uphill approach to turn 1, but the Mercedes driver lifted off the gas a little earlier.
Through a slightly later but significantly more aggressive turn-in phase, Leclerc was able to carry more momentum into the corner entry. However, this advantage dissipated due to a slight slide, so Antonelli had higher speed just before the apex, albeit only marginally.
Leclerc, in turn, had a much cleaner corner exit and barely touched the curb, whereas Antonelli was carried far onto the curb before straightening his Mercedes again. This cost valuable momentum on the exit.
Although Antonelli lifted off the brake later and got back on the gas earlier, the sheer thrust of the Mercedes ensured that he reached a higher top speed on the way to the kink in turn 2 and beyond.
Leclerc slightly faster than Antonelli in the middle sector
In the middle sector, the two cars were also separated by only milliseconds: 29.632 seconds for Leclerc versus 29.666 seconds for Antonelli. The Mercedes driver had to make up lost time here again. This happened in turn 3, where Antonelli lifted off earlier again.
The championship leader braked later in this section and in a clearly defined movement. Leclerc, on the other hand, overlapped brake and gas much more aggressively, forcing the rear to help him with the turn-in.
This resulted in a wonderfully smooth movement: the Monegasque hit the apex perfectly and used only the outer edge of the curb on the exit. Antonelli, however, again got his left wheels too far onto the curb and lost important time there.
On the way down to turn 4, the speed curves overlapped before the pendulum swung decisively in Antonelli’s favor. This indicates more electric power: the Mercedes could maintain a higher top speed, while the Ferrari slightly dropped off at the end of the straight, even though Leclerc stayed on the gas longer approaching turn 4.
However, it was Leclerc who slightly overdid the bend there. He got on the gas earlier and more aggressively, causing the car to be carried a bit too far outside through turn 4. This brought him to the track limit and just a few centimeters from the gravel trap.
Because Antonelli showed more patience on the acceleration, the 19-year-old found a cleaner line for the entry into turn 5. At the apex of turn 6, however, the Ferrari again recorded a slight speed advantage. Possibly Leclerc could have built an even bigger lead here, but Antonelli countered with extreme determination and a lot of courage.
He let the Mercedes be carried extremely wide over the curb on the exit and almost flirted with the gravel trap on the right side to position the car optimally for the lightning-fast left-right combination of turns 7 and 8.
In this section, the track still slopes slightly and features a tricky camber. Anyone who does not perfectly hit the delicate balance in turn 7 often leaves black tire marks on the right side, visible evidence of failed line choices.
At the end of the second sector, the two were separated by only a few hundredths of a second. Leclerc then slammed a time of 20.232 seconds into the asphalt of the third sector. Altogether, this resulted in a lap that was strong enough for the provisional best time at that moment.
The right gear choice as the key in the third sector
Then came Verstappen’s accident. When Antonelli reached that spot, he mistakenly interpreted the simply waved yellow flags as double yellow and completely took his foot off the gas. But what would have happened if he had only briefly lifted and continued his lap normally?
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On his previous fast lap, Antonelli’s time in this section was still 19.998 seconds. A well-dosed lift, similar to Russell’s, who recorded a 20.069 in the third sector on his pole lap, would have been enough for the stewards to prove that he slowed down appropriately.
And most likely, it would still have earned him second place, with a lead of about a tenth over Leclerc. Of course, Antonelli’s last sector from his final attempt cannot be compared one-to-one with Leclerc’s.
After all, Kimi aborted in turn 9 and rolled back to the pits leisurely after his yellow flag confusion. However, we can make a well-founded hypothesis by comparing Leclerc’s last fast lap with the third sector of Antonelli’s first lap.
So here we have 20.232 seconds from Leclerc versus 19.998 seconds from Antonelli. While the two were separated by only milliseconds in the first two sectors on their last flying laps, Mercedes seemed to have a clear advantage at the end of the lap.
Kimi Antonelli benefits from his Mercedes power
Studying the onboard footage of the two drivers, one sees a very similar line choice through the corners, but the devil is in the details. In our graphic, the delta display, which shows Antonelli about three tenths behind at the start of the sector, is somewhat misleading.
This is because Antonelli’s first fast lap is directly compared here with Leclerc’s absolute top lap at the end of the session. On that lap, the Mercedes driver was still significantly slower in the first two sectors.
What we can clearly see, however, is a marked speed difference of over 10 km/h on the approach to turn 9. Most of this difference, clearly in Antonelli’s favor, built up after Leclerc had already shifted into the highest gear.
Antonelli, on the other hand, stubbornly stayed in seventh gear from turn 8 until just before he braked for turn 9. At this point, where the approach goes over a blind crest, absolute determination and precision are required. Qualities that are rarely in doubt with these two exceptional drivers anyway.
In this corner, it was Antonelli who braked earlier this time. He combined this action with a gentle lift of the accelerator pedal to deliberately engage the rear and ease the turn-in. Leclerc chose the more conventional approach of late braking.
This led to the speed curves briefly overlapping in favor of the Ferrari. However, it was far from enough to make up the previously lost fractions of a second.
Did this speed difference on the approach now result from the Mercedes hybrid system flexing its muscles? Or did Antonelli simply benefit from a bit of slipstream when he caught up to Lewis Hamilton’s Ferrari, who was just on his out lap? The former is much more likely, as Lewis almost immediately gave way.
On the exit of turn 9, Leclerc then went more aggressively. He pressed the accelerator much more decisively, even as he was already balancing on the outer edge of the curbs, and thus at the tolerance limit of the stewards regarding track limits.
This allowed him to match Antonelli’s speed on the short downhill section to turn 10 and squeeze out another fraction of a second there because Antonelli braked a split second earlier. It was the typical Charles Leclerc move, a constant flirtation with disaster.
Anyone who carries even a hint too much speed here and misses the optimal line over the apex curb will inevitably have their car sail beyond the exit curb and cross the white line of the track limit.
Although Charles braked later, he was also on the brakes significantly longer. Here too, Antonelli was again in a lower gear, namely fourth instead of fifth, although Leclerc also briefly downshifted again at the end of his braking phase.
When Antonelli straightened his car again after leaving the exit curb, the usual picture appeared: the sheer punch of the Mercedes built a noticeably steeper speed curve. Although it was only a few kilometers per hour, this thrust was sustained enough to gain about a tenth of a second advantage on the short sprint to the finish line.
In the end, Antonelli would probably have managed to beat Leclerc’s time and secure second place for the Austrian Grand Prix if he had just briefly lifted before the yellow flag and then completed the lap normally.
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