{"id":946545,"date":"2026-10-30T16:02:16","date_gmt":"2026-10-30T16:02:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/946545\/"},"modified":"2026-10-30T16:02:16","modified_gmt":"2026-10-30T16:02:16","slug":"why-ignorance-is-a-superpower-for-kimi-antonelli-according-to-daniel-ricciardo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/946545\/","title":{"rendered":"Why \u201cignorance is a superpower\u201d for Kimi Antonelli, according to Daniel Ricciardo"},"content":{"rendered":"

Daniel Ricciardo<\/a> believes Kimi Antonelli<\/a>\u2019s age and innocence are what have made him so successful in the 2026 Formula 1 season.<\/p>\n

Nine victories so far in his sophomore F1 campaign have taken Antonelli to the brink of his maiden world title. All the Mercedes<\/a> driver needs to be crowned in Sunday\u2019s Mexican Grand Prix is ninth place, or for neither George Russell<\/a> nor Lewis Hamilton<\/a> to win.<\/p>\n

This would make the 20-year-old F1\u2019s youngest-ever champion, beating Sebastian Vettel<\/a>\u2019s current record by more than three years.<\/p>\n

Ricciardo, who made his F1 debut at 22 years old and retired from the world championship at 35, believes he knows exactly how Antonelli feels \u2013 and how that makes him so strong.<\/p>\n

\u201cI got asked by a friend about Kimi Antonelli the other day, and I said \u2018ignorance is a superpower\u2019 \u2013 you know, \u2018being young\u2019 is what I\u2019m really trying to say, I\u2019m not trying to be mean to him at all,\u201d the Australian told the Beyond The Grid podcast. \u201cBeing young is a superpower, being ignorant and not having been so exposed to the world and things like that.<\/p>\n

\u201cI remember my first year at Red Bull Racing<\/a>; you\u2019re naive, you\u2019re young, you\u2019re ignorant. I don\u2019t know, everything\u2019s easy and it comes easy, and it\u2019s just, \u2018Oh wow, I\u2019m winning, cool, I\u2019ll just keep winning, cause I\u2019m the best\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ricciardo joined Red Bull\u2019s main squad for the 2014 season following compatriot Mark Webber<\/a>\u2019s retirement, teaming up with Sebastian Vettel; he unexpectedly took all three of the outfit\u2019s victories that year, noticeably outperforming the reigning four-time world champion.<\/p>\n

\"Daniel <\/p>\n

Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull Racing RB10, leads Sebastian Vettel, Red Bull Racing RB10<\/p>\n

Photo by: Charles Coates \/ Motorsport Images<\/p>\n

There is an obvious parallel with the way Antonelli has surpassed Russell this year despite the Briton being Mercedes\u2019 established star.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t mean to compare myself to him or anything, but the power of being young in some situations where this sport and the world can be very intense, and over the years you\u2019re just going to accumulate baggage\u2026\u201d Ricciardo continued.<\/p>\n

\u201cRight now I think he\u2019s at that sweet spot where he\u2019s obviously very talented, very fast, but he hasn\u2019t yet really acquired any baggage, so it\u2019s like, let\u2019s just go and race. There\u2019s nothing really going on out there, which is a superpower.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat became a lot harder for me as the years went on. Even obviously the decision in 2018 to move on from Red Bull\u2026 These things, you obviously question them, and as years go on, it\u2019s like \u2018I haven\u2019t really found success or maybe how I\u2019d pictured it to go\u2019. These things keep popping up. \u2018Was that decision right? Now I\u2019ve done this, is that right?\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cAgain, an accumulation of many things, and I think by the end I had to dig very deep to find something where before it was just easy \u2013 I didn\u2019t really have to think, it was just there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read Also:<\/p>\n

After winning the United States GP, Antonelli pledged to maintain his philosophy for the remainder of the season, regardless of his impending coronation.<\/p>\n

\u201cI’m going to approach it with the same mindset, just trying to have as much fun as possible, trying to hopefully fight for another win,\u201d he said. \u201cBut it would be best to finish on a high, and that’s the goal. I’m just going to try to enjoy the rest of the season from now on.\u201d<\/p>\n

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– The Motorsport.com Team<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Daniel Ricciardo believes Kimi Antonelli\u2019s age and innocence are what have made him so successful in the 2026…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":946546,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[573],"tags":[513917,12295,64,63,141204,817,813,816,945,141203,85,513916],"class_list":["post-946545","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-according-to-daniel-ricciardo","tag-andrea-kimi-antonelli","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-autodromo-hermanos-rodriguez","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-mercedes","tag-mexican-gp","tag-sports","tag-why-u201cignorance-is-a-superpoweru201d-for-kimi-antonelli"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/946545","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=946545"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/946545\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/946546"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=946545"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=946545"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=946545"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}