Kimi Antonelli Takes His Maiden Win in Shanghai

A new race winner has been written into the history books after 19-year-old Kimi Antonelli took the chequered flag to secure his first F1 Grand Prix career victory! His Mercedes teammate joined him on the podium in second, and Lewis Hamilton - for the first time with his Italian team - managed to finish in the top 3 of a race.

Now, I'm sure whilst most of you were watching the F1 action over the course of the weekend, I was unable to watch anything - I know, terrible! However, I was in Milan, Italy for the weekend. Not sure if it's a coincidence that I spend one night in Italy and I wake up to see the only Italian on the grid winning. Nor watching a British driver get his first podium with Ferrari. I think I might need to go back every race week!

Unfortunately for some drivers though, it was a bad start before the race even began. Reigning World Champion Lando Norris, didn't even make it out to the dummy grid. But the troubles didn't get any better for the Woking-based team. Oscar Piastri did make it to the grid, but was soon rolled back down the pit lane by his mechanics making the Chinese Grand Prix a non-starter for the current Constructor's Champions. Fun fact: the safety car has raced more laps than Piastri this season. Alex Albon and Gabriel Borteletto also did not start the race.

Taking to the grid, and waiting for the five red lights was Antonelli, followed by Russell, Hamilton and Charles Leclerc. As the race began, Hamilton got an amazing start! And whilst Antonelli went to defend his teammate, the 7-time World Champion took the lead. In the next couple of corners, Antonelli was defending from Leclerc but managed to hold on to second place. Further down the grid, Max Verstappen, once again, did not have a good start. At the back, the Cadillac's made contact.

Lap 1 chaos continued when Isack Hadjar spun whilst fighting for position with Oliver Bearman. It was a near miss for the Brit who managed to take to the off track concrete and avoid crashing into the Red Bull.

It didn't take long for Antonelli to get past Hamilton and regain the lead of the race. A few corners after this, and going onto Lap 3, Russell took P3 from Leclerc - the Mercedes and Ferrari drivers having a battle once again up front. A lap later, Russell flew by his former teammate, making it a Mercedes 1-2.

There was some action in the pit lane when Verstappen, Sainz and Lawson all came in for a new set of tyres. On Lap 10, the Aston Martin of Lance Stroll pulled to the side of the track which allowed the Safety Car to be deployed. The top 4 all came in to change their tyres.

Racing continued and Russell went deep into a corner, which allowed for Hamilton to switch back and take the place from his fellow Brit. The Championship leader then fell back another place when Leclerc overtook him.

Leclerc channelled his inner Daniel Ricciardo, and made a late move past Hamilton to take second place on the podium - Russell close behind the pair. The racing between the Italian Stallions continued, in the meantime, allowing Antonelli to increase his lead out in P1.

Russell bided his time behind the Ferrari's and soon made a move past Hamilton for P3. A few laps later, the Mercedes man got past Leclerc too. But would he be able to bridge the 7.7 second gap between his and his teenage teammate?

There was contact between Esteban Ocon and Franco Colapinto - a shame for both drivers, who were running well. This crash ended up with the Frenchman receiving a 10-second time penalty for causing a collision.

Radio messages between Hamilton and his race engineer stated that he had no power! With a lock-up at the hairpin for Leclerc, it allowed Hamilton to get past him. It was nip and tuck between the Ferrari's for many laps to come - the two jostling for the last podium place.

After his poor start, Verstappen made it back up into the points but on Lap 46, he was told to retire the car. That means our 2 most recent World Champions did not score any points.

Antonelli rounded the last corner to take the chequered flag and become the second youngest Formula 1 winner in the history of the sport! It was a Mercedes affair with Russell taking P2, and ex-driver Hamilton grabbing is first podium in red.

On the podium with the 3 drivers, Peter Bonnington (Antonelli's current race engineer and Hamilton's previous one) stood next to them. In the words of Toto Wolff, it felt like Mercedes had three drivers stood up there.

Here is a quote from our brand new race winner: "I’m speechless. I’m about to cry, to be honest. Thank you so much to my team, because they helped me to achieve this dream," said Antonelli. "I’m super happy. I said yesterday I really wanted to bring Italy back on top and we did today, even though I gave myself a little bit of a heart attack towards the end with the flat-spot. It was a good race."

If any of you are wondering about my Fantasy Formula 1 points after this race, well good news... I am no longer last - YAY! But I am 50 points behind the person in front of me so I do have some ground to make up.

We now have one weekend off before F1 goes back to Suzuka, Japan - one of the favourite tracks amongst our drivers. It's looking like this years title fight is going to be between 2 teams and 4 drivers. Will Max Verstappen have better luck? And will Oscar Piastri actaully be able to do at least one lap of racing? We will find out on the 29th!