Kimi Antonelli suffered ‘big time’ loss after Dutch GP qualifying error

ZANDVOORT – Kimi Antonelli has revealed he lost a significant chunk of downforce early in Sprint Qualifying for the Dutch GP Sprint after going off track.

The championship leader ran off the road during the early moments of Sprint Qualifying, with the incident resulting in damage to his W17.

Kimi Antonelli reveals significant Mercedes downforce loss

Antonelli had returned to action after the summer break by topping the times in the damp to dry practice session at the Zandvoort Circuit, but could only manage fifth in Sprint Qualifying after suffering damage to his car.

While Mercedes teammate George Russell logged a 1:11.567, Antonelli’s best time was two-tenths of a second faster, but a contributing factor to his relative lack of speed could be down to a loss of downforce.

The Italian was on his first run in SQ1 when he lost the rear going through the penultimate corner, going off into the gravel and bouncing across it before rejoining the tarmac.

Reporting that he lost the rear “very weirdly”, he regrouped to make it through the session and SQ2, before settling for his eventual fifth place.

Speaking afterwards, he revealed that he had suffered “big time” damage in the off.

“I had a couple of holes in the floor, so when I came in, they initially said it was a [downforce] loss of 25 points,” he said.

“Then they tried to repair it as much as possible, but yeah, definitely the damage was still there. I was struggling a lot in the low speed, but yeah, it is what it is.

“It was a little bit too much entry speed in the last corner in that lap one, and lost the rear and went through the gravel, and that was pretty much it.

“And then obviously, it also was not easy to build the confidence back.

“But, still, decently close, and we’ll have another go tomorrow.”

The slip means that Russell could be in a position to wrestle some points back on his teammate in the Drivers’ Championship, with Antonelli currently 59 points ahead of the Brit as the second half of the season begins.

“We’ll try to do the best race we can,” Antonelli said of this prospect, with the chances of a recovery drive in a repaired car made more difficult by the competitiveness of rivals such as McLaren and Ferrari.

“Of course, it’s very close at the front, so it’s not going to be easy to overtake.

“But yeah, we’ll try to do the best we can, even with the damage, and then from qualifying, we’re going to tidy the car up and go again.”

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