A different Friday for Antonelli
With a 30-place penalty for replacing several parts of his power unit exceeding the regulatory limit (the fifth internal combustion engine, the fourth energy store, and the fourth control unit), Andrea Kimi Antonelli will start from the last place on the starting grid of the Italian Grand Prix.
This led to a somewhat different Friday practice organization focused on race recovery, with space for a slipstream test that – most likely – the world championship leader will give to his teammate George Russell.
Antonelli ended the day in third place, 0.141 seconds behind his teammate, who topped FP2.
Antonelli and the slipstream to Russell
Speaking to the media at the end of the two practice sessions, Antonelli explained: “This was a very different Friday than usual, much more focused than usual on long runs and consecutive laps. But it was a good day, we gathered a lot of data and we look forward to tomorrow. In FP1 we tried a bit of slipstreaming with George, to have a reference for tomorrow and it seemed to work quite well. So we’ll see for tomorrow, because the slipstream effect will count a lot here. I think in qualifying the cars will be very close to each other and it will be interesting.”
Thoughts on comeback
Some bet on Antonelli finishing in the top 5 on Sunday and others, like Alonso, think he will reach the podium. Andrea Kimi keeps it low: “I think here it will be a bit better in terms of overtaking compared to previous years, because with the energy you can do different things. It will be very interesting. The atmosphere is incredible too, I am enjoying the weekend much more than last year, I am more relaxed”.
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Asked about a comparison related to Monza with the 2025 cars, he emphasized: “From an energy point of view it is obviously very different, but better than we expected. In corners the car is quite fast because we use big wings. On the straights we are a bit slower, but better than we could have expected,” Antonelli concluded.
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