Following 168澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果历史:Fernando Alonso’s contract renewal at Aston Martin, attention in the F1 driver market is sꦍwitchiജng to what Mercedes will now do.

Mercedes are in need of a replacement for 168澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果历史:Lewis Hamilton, who is joining Ferrari next season, with free agent 168澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果历史:Carlos Sainz an obvious candidate to fill the vacant seat.

However, it is believed that Mercedes’ favoured Hamilton replacemenജt is their 17-year-old protege Andrea Kimi Antonelli.

Thanks to the Italian teenager’s meteoric rise through the junior categories, Antonelli is already being touted as Mercedes’ 168澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果历史:Max Verstappen.

Mercedes are seemingly happy to wait and evaluate Antonelli’s progress during his rookie Formula 2 campaign be♉fore making a call, and have already lined up a maiden F1 test for the teenage sensation♌ at the Red Bull Ring.

There have been suggestions that Mercedes could place Antonelli into an F1 seat at customer team Williams before the end of 🦂this season, to help get him up to speed ahead of a potential graduation to the works team in 2025.

That would be𓄧 permitted under F1’s regulations once🐓 Antonelli has turned 18 on August 25. He has already accumulated the required super licence points from F4 and his two Formula Regional titles.

The prospect of an early promoti🌌on for Antonel👍li this year was discussed on the latest episode of the F1 Nation podcast.

“I see Max staying, I see Checo staying, we see Fernando Alonso staying. So the only question mark is what happens alongside George Russell? Is that going to be Carlos Sainz?” host Tom Clarkson said of the driver mar🐻ket.

“Is that going to be Kimiꦬ Antonelli, who is testing for Mercedes at the Red Bull Ring in a couple of weeks’ time? But equally, is 💎Toto Wolff going to want to give Antonelli a little bit of mileage?

“He turns 18 at 🍬the end of August, and 18 is the magic number in Formula 1 now because you can’t race younger than that.

“So could we see Antonelli do t🔯he second half of the season at Williams before then getting plugged into the Mercedes next year? Who knows, but now it’s all about Mercedes.”

Such a scenario might make sense for Williams if the team was already planning to replace 168澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果历史:Logan Sargeant next season. The Grove-based outfit also have history of running Mercedes juniors, having fielded 168澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果历史:George Russell from 2019 until his promotion in 2022.

In the event Mercedes and Toto Wolff do put their faith in Antonelli for 2025, and in doing so overlook Sainz, the Spaniard could e♊nd up being an option for the likes of Williams or Sauber/Audi.