'Very scary!' - Antonelli relieved Verstappen is not in F1 title fight

Kimi Antonelli says it would be "very scary" if Max Verstappen was a championship rival after the Red Bull driver won the last two Formula 1 races.

Verstappen scored maximum points across the Sprint weekend in Singapore to add to his victory earlier this month in Malaysia but, unlike last year, is too far back to make a championship charge.

In fact, Antonelli could wrap up the title at the next race in Austin on October 23-25, live on Sky Sports F1, if he outscores Mercedes team-mate George Russell by 23 points and Ferrari's Lewis Hamilton by 14 points.

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Antonelli had another damage limitation weekend in Singapore but still finished on the podium in third after a good strategy call by Mercedes to give him fresh soft tyres to overtake McLaren's Lando Norris and Hamilton late on in Sunday's race.

It was an unexpected result given the new upgrades, which Mercedes introduced in Malaysia, were not giving the major performance gain the team expected.

"It would be very scary!" Antonelli told Sky Sports F1 when asked if he is glad Verstappen is not in this year's championship battle.

"All in all I feel like we are doing a great job. At the end, you look at the season, and we have always been there.

"Obviously we have had a great car and now we are trying to understand this new package. I'm very proud of the team this weekend because we pushed through the difficulties and started to see life at the end of the tunnel. It's just a matter of time.

"Now we go to Austin, a normal weekend, where we can hopefully do a lot of changes and understand the package more."

Antonelli, 20, is set to break Sebastian Vettel's record of being the youngest F1 world champion and has six races to get over the line.

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff is usually cautious with his expectations but even he admits Antonelli is almost certainly going to win the title.

"You look at the numbers and ask the probability of him winning, and it's probably almost 100 per cent. But it's motor racing, you can break down, you can have accidents, and then things could start to stress," he told Sky Sports F1.

"So, I think we need to look at it race by race, make sure that we are continuing to score the points, and eventually hopefully it's going to come towards him."

Verstappen: Maybe Lambiase was happy radio was not working!

Red Bull's recent resurgence appears to have ended Mercedes' large dominance over the season, although Verstappen's win in Singapore was not straightforward as he was unable to talk to the team for the whole race.

Verstappen, who has won at every track on the calendar apart from Madrid, could hear his engineer Gianpiero Lambiase, but not the other way around.

"Maybe he was happy that it was not working! I couldn't really say anything. He did try at one point to ask me a few things in code, and I think he understood well what I meant or did not do," said Verstappen.

"But it's never nice. I've been having difficulty with my radio already the whole season, and this weekend has been particularly bad."

The biggest threat to Verstappen's win came at the start from Charles Leclerc as Red Bull have been poor off the line throughout 2026.

However, Verstappen got a good enough launch to move to the inside and pinch Leclerc, forcing the Ferrari driver to brake early and back out of the move.

"The start was critical, so that was just good enough. Something was not particularly right at the start, so I need to understand what went wrong there," he said.

"Before releasing the clutch, it didn't feel good. But it was just good enough. Then we had a few laps with some deployment issues, so that's where Charles almost got me actually into Turn 7.

"Once we had cleared the deployment problems, it was fine. The car was really good on the tyres. I could really manage them well.

"But to be honest, I think it was one of the first times that I've driven in clean air here in Singapore in the race, so I guess that's also nice.

"It's been just a fantastic weekend for us. I mean, we were flying on the soft, we were okay on the medium, and then of course with the VSC, I think it was right what Charles did with pitting and going back on a soft tyre. But, we just had it under control and of course, really happy to win here."

Formula 1 next heads to The Americas for another triple header with the United States Grand Prix in Austin up first on October 23-25, live on Sky Sports F1. Stream Sky Sports with NOW - no contract, cancel anytime