{"id":945553,"date":"2026-10-29T20:30:13","date_gmt":"2026-10-29T20:30:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/945553\/"},"modified":"2026-10-29T20:30:13","modified_gmt":"2026-10-29T20:30:13","slug":"antonelli-skips-f1-mexico-gp-media-day-due-to-illness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/945553\/","title":{"rendered":"Antonelli skips F1 Mexico GP media day due to illness"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kimi Antonelli won\u2019t attend Formula 1\u2019s Mexico Grand Prix on Thursday due to feeling unwell, the Mercedes<\/a> team has revealed.<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for the Anglo-German outfit told media that the championship leader was \u201cfeeling under the weather\u201d due to a \u201cviral illness\u201d he has been recovering from, with the FIA therefore excusing him from today\u2019s media activities.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe expect him to be back tomorrow,\u201d the statement continued.<\/p>\n

Antonelli is on the brink of a maiden F1 title, which would make him the youngest world champion as he would beat Sebastian Vettel<\/a>\u2019s 2010 record by over three years. All he needs on Sunday is ninth place, or for neither George Russell<\/a> nor Lewis Hamilton<\/a> to win.<\/p>\n

Read Also:<\/p>\n

The 20-year-old Italian won\u2019t be the only driver to skip media day, with Valtteri Bottas<\/a> also calling in sick; Cadillac notified media that the Finn was \u201cunwell\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe team has taken the decision to allow him a day of rest, to support his recovery,\u201d the statement read.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a precautionary measure and does not currently affect his participation in the remainder of the race weekend. We will continue to monitor the situation and provide updates if necessary.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Valtteri <\/p>\n

Valtteri Bottas, Cadillac Racing<\/p>\n

Photo by: James Sutton \/ LAT Images via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Who will step up if necessary?<\/p>\n

Albeit unlikely, there is a chance of a reserve driver being called up for either racer.<\/p>\n

At Mercedes, that would be 2023 Formula 2 runner-up Frederik Vesti, who has never competed in a grand prix but is scheduled to make his seventh career Free Practice 1 outing this weekend in George Russell\u2019s car.<\/p>\n

As far as Cadillac is concerned, Zhou Guanyu<\/a> is the team\u2019s reserve driver, so the seven-time points scorer would make his F1 return after he wound up his three-year stint with Alfa Romeo\/Sauber at the end of the 2024 campaign.<\/p>\n

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– The Autosport.com Team<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kimi Antonelli won\u2019t attend Formula 1\u2019s Mexico Grand Prix on Thursday due to feeling unwell, the Mercedes team…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":945554,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[12295,512928,64,63,141204,318988,817,813,816,945,141203,85,1512],"class_list":["post-945553","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-andrea-kimi-antonelli","tag-antonelli-skips-f1-mexico-gp-media-day-due-to-illness","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-autodromo-hermanos-rodriguez","tag-cadillac-f1-team","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-mercedes","tag-mexican-gp","tag-sports","tag-valtteri-bottas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/945553","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=945553"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/945553\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/945554"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=945553"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=945553"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=945553"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}