Before Mercedes, Ferrari had the opportunity to invest in Formula 1’s new star, Kimi Antonelli. His father, Marco, explained to Fanpage.it why it didn’t happen.
The victory at the 2026 Chinese Grand Prix has cast everything in a new light. Kimi Antonelli won his first Formula 1 race, bringing an Italian back to the top step of the podium twenty years after Giancarlo Fisichella. In just two race weekends, he confirmed he is the talent Mercedes decided to truly back. At Shanghai, the 19-year-old from Bologna also became the second youngest winner in F1 history, behind only Max Verstappen.
It is precisely for this reason that a long-standing question has resurfaced: how is it possible that a driver born and raised in Bologna, just 45 kilometers from Maranello, never entered Ferrari’s orbit? The answer, in fact, had already been given long before his Formula 1 debut, in an interview with Fanpage.it by his father Marco Antonelli.
The key passage is clear and perfectly explains the missed connection between the young Italian talent and the Rossa. When asked about contacts with Ferrari, Marco Antonelli replied: “He was racing with the Ferrari brand when he debuted in karting, and at the time there was Massimo Rivola (today CEO of Aprilia Racing, ed.) as head of the Ferrari Driver Academy. They wanted to bring him into the program immediately, but then they told us he was too young to be properly evaluated. That was the only time there was any contact with Ferrari, so this was before I received the call from Mercedes.”
This response says it all. Before Mercedes, Ferrari—then led by Maurizio Arrivabene—had seen Kimi Antonelli up close but chose not to make a move. Or rather, they decided to pause, believing he was still too young for a proper assessment. Shortly afterward, Toto Wolff called, building a precise path for him that eventually led to Formula 1. Today, with the Shanghai victory, that gamble seems already won, even in the eyes of those who had once doubted his readiness.
Of course, this is not meant as a posthumous judgment of Ferrari’s management decision from years ago. Rather, it highlights the paradox immediately visible to anyone who has watched the most promising driver of Italy’s motorsport scene triumph in the world’s most prestigious championship with a German team based in the UK. The most promising Italian driver of his generation, raised in the heart of the Motor Valley, has now become the emblematic figure for Mercedes. Meanwhile, Ferrari continues chasing the title with Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton, while the Italian glory in F1 has been claimed by a young man the Maranello team had once encountered—but never fully committed to.
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