Two sponsors terminated their deals with Mercedes when the team announced an 18-year-old rookie as Lewis Hamilton’s replacement. Two years later, that rookie is Formula 1’s youngest ever world drivers’ champion.

Toto Wolff disclosed the sponsor exits in an interview with Sky in Mexico City the weekend Kimi Antonelli clinched the title. The Austrian said the partners had wanted answers about the signing he was not going to be able to give at the time.

“We had two sponsors leaving us because of that, because of ‘who is this kid?’” Wolff told Sky.

He did not name the companies.

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‘I called Bradley and said, Kimi is in the car’

Mercedes confirmed Antonelli as Hamilton’s replacement at Monza on August 31, 2024, six days after the Mercedes junior academy driver’s 18th birthday. Wolff has said he settled on him within minutes of Hamilton informing him, in January 2024, that he was joining Ferrari.

The team principal told Sky he phoned Bradley Lord, who was promoted to deputy team principal before the 2026 season, straight after that call.

“It was instinctive. Lewis left. I called Bradley and said, ‘Kimi is in the car next year’.”

Wolff framed the move retrospectively as a measured bet rather than a leap into the dark, calling it a calculated risk and not a real one.

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Nine wins and a 73-year wait for Italy

Antonelli finished third in the Mexico City Grand Prix on November 1, behind race winner Max Verstappen and Hamilton, and that was enough. He secured the drivers’ championship with four rounds still to run, aged 20 years and 68 days, breaking Sebastian Vettel’s record as F1’s youngest champion.

Antonelli had won nine Grands Prix in 2026, including his home race at Monza, and is the first Italian world drivers’ champion since Alberto Ascari in 1953, ending a 73-year wait. The 2026 car reset flipped the picture after a rough rookie year: he won nine races against teammate George Russell’s three.

Mercedes can complete the double at the next round. The team leads Ferrari by 126 points in the constructors’ standings heading into the São Paulo Grand Prix at Interlagos, where the race starts at 2pm local time on Sunday, November 8.

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