Kimi Antonelli has given a candid description of how he overcome a mental obstacle to secure the best starting position of his early Formula One career.
Antonelli struggled throughout practice on his maiden visit to Suzuka, missing a Super Formula test due to sickness, and was in risk of being eliminated early in Q1, but he made it through safely.
He eventually finished sixth on the grid, a career high after finishing 16th and eighth in Australia and China, 0.237 seconds behind teammate George Russell on an all-Mercedes third row.
Antonelli is the highest-placed rookie on the F1 grid this season, and he was one of three to make Q3, along with seventh-placed Isack Hadjar and Ollie Bearman in tenth, but the result was not without hurdles for the Italian, as he revealed.
“I am pleased with how the session went, but I am disappointed because I had to take such a big step forward from free practice,” Antonelli told RacingNews365.
‘I felt quite lost in practice; I had no confidence to push harder and make progress, and I was kind of stuck from where I finished in FP1.
“I had to go into qualifying with very little confidence and a major step forward in my driving, but I’m getting there step by step.
“It is obviously a useful lesson ahead of the race, but it is difficult in the first sector since it is quite narrow, and you must time all of the turns well.
“But with the set-up, we started cautiously because I lacked confidence, but the track was improving and cooling down, and I lacked the bravery to push the set-up any further.
“It is incredibly terrible when you are stuck there and you see that you are battling to make steps; mentally, it is difficult, especially when you realize that……..
“So I had to dig really deep and try to focus on what I had to do, and eventually it was a decent lap, but it was far from perfect, but I cannot complain about it either.”
