The 2026 F1 Miami GP Sprint Race was one to forget for Mercedes’ Kimi Antonelli. Despite a strong Sprint qualifying the day before, the Italian driver found himself struggling for pace during the race.
Antonelli finished the 2026 F1 Miami GP Sprint in P4, just ahead of teammate George Russell. However, he was later given a five-second time penalty for track limits, which pushed him down into P6. This marks the first race of the 2026 F1 season that did not end with a Mercedes victory
Antonelli on what went wrong during the 2026 F1 Miami GP Sprint
The Italian driver had placed himself on the front row during Sprint Qualifying the previous day and started the race in P2. However, a poor start at lights out had Antonelli drop from P2 to P4 on the opening lap.
Mercedes entered the 2026 F1 Miami GP weekend with a lack of upgrades for their F1 W17. The car lacked performance on track in comparison with the upgraded cars on the grid, the likes of McLaren and Ferrari.
Antonelli shared that despite his performance during the Sprint, ahead of the 2026 F1 Miami GP weekend, he and the team had been working hard during the five-week break to sort out the starts. It did not pay off.
“We’ve been doing work over the break and, you know, on my side, for once, I did everything right with the procedures, so we need to check what happened.”
The Italian also revealed that he had very low grip off the line.
He even admitted to letting his frustration affect his performance, hence his track limit penalty.
After a disappointing Sprint race at the 2026 F1 Miami GP, Antonelli is now focused on redeeming himself during Qualifying. He will be looking to maximise his points this weekend and defend his Championship lead. The 19-year-old is now only seven points ahead of Russell in the standings.
“The grip was very low, probably, you know, lower than we expected. Then after that, I was really frustrated, I didn’t even drive well, I did a lot of mistakes, you know, I got track limits and, which is something that they need to avoid and, yeah, but this weekend definitely has been more difficult but was expected, you know, with everyone bringing big upgrades and, yeah, you know, we just got to try to maximise the weekend. Now we’ll focus onto qualifying.”
