Antonelli's gravel excursion costs Mercedes 25 points of downforce at Dutch GP sprint qualifying

Kimi Antonelli qualified fifth for Saturday’s Dutch Grand Prix sprint race after a costly gravel excursion at Turn 13 left his Mercedes with significant floor damage, costing the team an estimated 25 points of downforce at Zandvoort.

The Formula 1 championship leader was running quicker than team-mate George Russell on his first flying lap of SQ1 when a snap of oversteer through the penultimate corner sent him into the gravel. Antonelli kept the car pointing forward and rejoined the track, but the lap was ruined — he ended SQ1 eighth, almost 0.7 seconds off Charles Leclerc’s benchmark.

“I had a couple of holes in the floor,” Antonelli said. “So when I came in, they initially said it was a loss of 25 points. Then they tried to repair as much as possible, but yeah, definitely the damage was still there. I was struggling a lot in the low speed.”

He added: “I had a little bit too much entry speed in the last corner on that lap one and lost the rear and went through the gravel. And then obviously it was not easy to build the confidence back, but still, decently close. We’ll have another go tomorrow.”

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff put the downforce loss at closer to 20 points rather than 25, but acknowledged it was “quite a big hit.” A conservative estimate of the aerodynamic deficit translates to roughly half a second in lap time, which goes some way to explaining why Antonelli was 0.2 seconds behind Russell when the pair reached SQ3.

Antonelli will line up on the third row for the 24-lap sprint, behind Russell and both McLarens, with Leclerc’s Ferrari splitting the two Silver Arrows cars. The final laps of the top four qualifiers were separated by less than a tenth of a second, underlining how tightly matched Mercedes, McLaren, and Ferrari have become in 2026.

The tight and technical nature of the Zandvoort circuit is expected to make overtaking difficult, but Antonelli will at least get the chance to run a repaired floor in full qualifying once parc ferme reopens after the sprint.

“We’ll try to do the best race we can,” he said. “Of course it’s very close at the front, so it’s not going to be easy to overtake. But we’ll try to do the best we can, even with the damage. And then from qualifying, we’re going to tidy the car up and go.”