{"id":28980,"date":"2025-07-28T15:35:49","date_gmt":"2025-07-28T15:35:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/28980\/"},"modified":"2025-07-28T15:35:49","modified_gmt":"2025-07-28T15:35:49","slug":"kimi-antonelli-reveals-lewis-hamiltons-empowering-words-amid-spa-debacle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/28980\/","title":{"rendered":"Kimi Antonelli reveals Lewis Hamilton\u2019s empowering words amid Spa debacle"},"content":{"rendered":"

Andrea Kimi Antonelli<\/a>\u00a0revealed Lewis Hamilton<\/a> paid him an uplifting visit following the Formula 1 rookie\u2019s poor showing in qualifying for the Belgian Grand Prix<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Antonelli was outqualified by Mercedes<\/a> team-mate George Russell<\/a> for the eighth time in a row on Saturday, again failing to emerge out of Q1 as he took 18th place<\/a>, 0.355s slower than the Briton.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The 18-year-old Italian was visibly upset about his result when he tardily attended the media pen<\/a> following his Q1 exit, but he enjoyed unexpected support from seven-time world champion Hamilton.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cHe came to say hi to the team, and definitely we had a couple of words,\u201d Antonelli recounted. \u201cHe was telling me to keep my head up and that it’s normal to have bad weekends. And just to keep believing. It was really nice.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Arguably the last rookie to race for a top team on debut, having joined McLaren<\/a> at 22-years-old with much success in 2007, Hamilton sympathized again with his young peer when Sky Sports F1 suggested he might know what Antonelli is going through in that position.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Lewis <\/p>\n

Lewis Hamilton, Ferrari, Andrea Kimi Antonelli, Mercedes<\/p>\n

Photo by: Sam Bagnall \/ Sutton Images via Getty Images<\/p>\n

\u201cI can’t imagine what it’s like at 18 \u2013 or try to imagine what it’s like at 18 \u2013 to do what he’s doing,\u201d Hamilton insisted. \u201cHe’s been doing fantastic. But to be thrown in at the deep end at 18\u2026 he hadn’t even had his driving licence when he first started racing.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it’s a lot on someone’s shoulders. He’s doing a great job and he’s got a great group of people around him. So, I think you’ve just got to take it in your stride, which I think he is.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd he’s got Bono [race engineer Peter Bonnington, who formerly worked\u00a0with Hamilton] by his side. He doesn’t have anyone better.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Antonelli started the main Spa-Francorchamps race from the pitlane as the team attempted to sort his confidence issues by giving him a high-downforce rear wing. The goal was to make his W16 more stable; this did help the Mercedes driver feel more comfortable to some extent, though he struggled to make significant progress and finished 16th from 19th at the start.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThose few laps where I was in free air I definitely had a lot more fun,\u201d he said, having spent most of his race in traffic. \u201cThen being stuck is quite frustrating, because you can’t really unleash the real pace you have. Once I was stuck, I was two seconds slower all of a sudden.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Read Also:<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was tricky, but I think I shouldn’t be starting that far back. I think I need to work on my qualifying and work to get the confidence back with the car in order to start more at the front. Because in those races where I started more at the front, it was a completely different story,\u201d the one-time podium finisher concluded.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Photos from Belgian GP – Race<\/p>\n

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In this article<\/p>\n

Be the first to know and subscribe for real-time news email updates on these topics<\/p>\n

Subscribe to news alerts<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Andrea Kimi Antonelli\u00a0revealed Lewis Hamilton paid him an uplifting visit following the Formula 1 rookie\u2019s poor showing in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":28981,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[8895,2968,1687,13216,372,6537,832,6964,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-28980","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-f1","8":"tag-andrea-kimi-antonelli","9":"tag-belgian-gp","10":"tag-f1","11":"tag-f1-belgian-grand-prix-2025","12":"tag-formula-1","13":"tag-formula1","14":"tag-lewis-hamilton","15":"tag-mercedes","16":"tag-sports","17":"tag-uk","18":"tag-united-kingdom","19":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28980","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28980"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28980\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28981"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28980"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28980"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28980"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}