Lewis Hamilton has admitted that he was ‘quite emotional’ ahead of FP3 at the Italian Grand Prix on Saturday after Mercedes confirmed that Kimi Antonelli will replace him for the 2025 season and beyond.
The Brit’s departure from Mercedes was confirmed back in February, but there has been a long wait for his successor to be confirmed. For some time now though, it has been known that Antonelli is the future of the Silver Arrows.
For Hamilton though, it wasn’t until the official announcement was made on Saturday morning that the true weight of his departure came over him.
“It was very, very, very surreal to just have, at least officially confirmed, my seat is going that I held onto for so long,” he said. “So it was quite emotional this morning.”
Despite the emotions, he was quick to congratulate the 18-year-old. Posting on his Instagram story, Hamilton wrote: “Congrats Kimi Antonelli. I have no doubt that you’ll bring a lot to the team alongside George next year (clapping emoji).”
While Hamilton is only just coming to grips with the fact that his 12-year stay at Mercedes is ending, team principal Toto Wolff has revealed that he knew instantly that Antonelli was the man to replace his star driver.
I made up my mind five minutes after Lewis Hamilton told me that he’s going to Ferrari,” Wolff revealed in Monza. “Obviously, we were discussing other options and also didn’t discount the Max idea by looking at what happened at Red Bull.
“But, instinctively, this is the lineup with these two that I always wanted, bearing in mind the fast-tracking that we did with Kimi and everything related there too, but that was immediately what I wanted to do.”
Antonelli will arrive in F1 with extreme hype, but there will no doubt be some nerves too. The teenager crashed just two laps into his FP1 debut on Friday and will have limited opportunities to drive the W15 again before the end of the season.
