Kimi Antonelli’s F1 antics last season left George Russell disappointed (Image: Getty)
George Russell was left disappointed with after the starlet broke the Guenther Steiner’s golden rule in Ahead of the teenager’s Grand Prix debut, the Italian will race alongside his Brit team-mate for the first time on Sunday at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix of the 2025 F1 campaign.
While it will be Antonelli’s first time competing in a Grand Prix this weekend, the 18-year-old is not unfamiliar with the highest level of racing given his experience last year when he participated in the first practice session of the Italian GP at Monza. Finding himself in Russell’s W15, Antonelli had a horror session as he spun at the Parabolica corner ten minutes into his drive before crashing into the wall, which called time on his brief practice.
Among the several critics who slammed the youngster for his crash on the track, Russell was left unhappy with the performance of his future team-mate which Antonelli revealed in a post-practice interview. Speaking to Sky Italia, said: “[Russell] was not very happy, but before going out at the Parabolica I was going strong. With George I have a good relationship, he did not give me much advice, but for now everything is fine. But next year I want to beat him.”
Former Haas F1 Principal Guenther Steiner noted on the Red Flags Podcast at the time how the teen broke F1’s golden rule, which would justify Russell’s disappointment. After Elisofon asked Steiner: “What’s the number one rule – the first thing you tell an F2 guy that’s taking over your car?” the engineer responded: “Don’t crash it.”
He then added: “If you crash it, you will be remembered as the guy – bracket open, idiot, bracket closed – which crashed the car in his first FP1. If you finish second-last, last, third-last, fifth-last, eleventh in FP1 nobody really cares – everybody will have forgotten where you finished cause nobody cares in FP1 where you finish. So don’t crash it because everybody will remember it.” When asked by Elisofon: “And he broke the one rule?”
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Kimi Antonelli is set for F1 debut in Melbourne this weekend (Image: Getty)
Antonelli, who is replacing the legendary , failed to handle the pressure of being a driver, according to ex-Jordan F1 team boss Eddie Jordan. He said prior to the teen joining the Silver Arrows that he should be at a lower-profile team before making the jump to .
“We always said that I thought the pressure of would be too much for Kimi and his debut and his first run – and it turned out that’s the way it was,” he said on the Formula For Success podcast. “He spun out and he caused a lot of damage to the car. I still believe that there’s a place for Kimi but it’s not in . That’s the point I’m trying to make. I don’t care how quick he is, he should be placed somewhere that will give Toto [Wolff] and his team the chance to learn for a year and come up that way.”