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Red Bull Racing team principal Helmut Marko recently revealed that he bumped into Mercedes's Andrea Kimi Antonelli during the Belgian GP weekend. Furthermore, he revealed an issue the latter has been facing with their car.
Mercedes and Red Bull have been competing at a high level this season, sitting in third and fourth place in the Constructors' Championship, respectively. Both teams have had a similar trend in the past few races, with only one of their two drivers outperforming their competition within the top. Kimi Antonelli, Mercedes's rookie driver, performed quite fabulously at the start of the season, but there has been a certain decline in recent races.
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Helmut Marko, RBR's advisor, mentioned that Antonelli revealed he wasn't confident with the W16. Further quoting the young Italian's lack of experience, Marko stated that it's more of a "mental thing" for him.
"I don’t want to make any outside comments on how things work for any other team. Antonelli is certainly very fast, but also a very young driver,” Mark said (via PlanetF1). "Strangely enough, we spoke briefly in the hotel at Spa, and he said that he has no confidence in the car. As soon as he pushes, he no longer has control."
He then mentioned that it is essential for the Mercedes W16 to be within the optimal working window; hence, George Russell can extract the most out of it. Marko also stated that it was good for RBR that the Brackley-based outfit didn't have the "luxury" of a second team, referring to Racing Bulls.
"It’s more of a mental thing, and it seems that [with] his car, like ours, it’s very critical to be in the working window. When it does work, it’s much more potent, and of course, a driver like Russell does it much more easily."
"Mercedes, thank goodness, don’t have the luxury of a second team."
Many rookie drivers joined the grid this season, including Kimi Antonelli and Isack Hadjar. These two have been the best-performing ones so far, considering their position in the championship rankings.
Kimi Antonelli reveals what "killed" his confidence in the Mercedes
As mentioned, Antonelli was quite a promising driver during the initial stages of the season; however, that form has recently worn off. Speaking to the media, he revealed that it only happened after Mercedes introduced the new suspension upgrade.
He also claimed that his driving style wasn't suited to the car with the suspension upgrade, which made him lose more confidence in himself.
"Since we went on the new suspension, the car was a bit trickier to drive, especially on tracks where there was high-speed context, so high-speed corners, high-speed combined," Kimi Antonelli said. "Also, because of my driving style, I was making the car even more unpredictable, and that killed a bit my confidence."
Antonelli is the youngest driver on the grid. He is also the only rookie to have scored a podium this season, with his P3 finish in Canada. But that race was followed by two consecutive DNFs, and then a P16 finish in Spa.
