Nobody had asked him about it. At the end of his media session at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez on Sunday, with Antonelli already crowned at the age of 20, Wolff decided he had one more thing to say.
“This notion of win at all costs, selfish, opportunistic, ruthlessness for your own benefit, that model of racing driver has died,” Wolff told reporters in Mexico City.
He then held his new champion up as the opposite.
“He should be a role model for many other young drivers in junior formulas. He should be a role model for the few entitled ones in Formula One, the endless moaners on the radio, the ones that complain, the ones that crash.”
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Wolff did not name anyone. He did not have to. The remark landed in a weekend already shaped by driver politics, from Antonelli’s record title fight to a disciplinary row over Russell’s exit.
A title secured, a teammate in bits
Antonelli finished third behind race winner Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton to clinch the 2026 championship on 1 November. At 20 years and 68 days he became the youngest world champion in Formula 1 history, surpassing Sebastian Vettel’s long-standing mark.
Russell, Antonelli’s Mercedes teammate, finished sixth after a 10-second penalty for a first-lap collision. By the time the chequered flag fell he had already decided he was not sticking around for the microphones.
He left the circuit without speaking to broadcasters or the written press. The FIA fined Mercedes €5,000 for the missed media duties, the governing body noting that no dispensation had been granted.
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‘Him staying would have surprised me’
Wolff defended his driver without hesitation.
“Him not doing the media work or leaving the track is absolutely understandable,” Wolff told The Race, pointing to an energy-deployment problem at the start that triggered the collision, the penalty and the sixth-place finish on the day his teammate took the title.
“Him staying would have actually surprised me.”
The attack on “entitled” drivers was not aimed at Russell. Wolff instead held Antonelli up as the template, telling reporters that the Italian had shown it was possible to win in F1 by being a good person.
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Antonelli won nine races in only his second season after replacing Hamilton at Mercedes in 2025. He is also the first Italian world champion since Alberto Ascari in 1953.
Mercedes head to the Sao Paulo Grand Prix next, with Antonelli’s title in hand and Russell fighting to salvage second in the drivers’ standings.
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