Kimi Antonelli will sit out the opening practice at the Barcelona Grand Prix, with Mercedes handing his W17 to reserve driver Frederik Vesti.
The Danish driver will cover the first of the team’s four young driver FP1 sessions for the F1 2026 championship.
Frederik Vesti to replace Kimi Antonelli in Barcelona FP1
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The FP1 young driver regulation in Formula 1 mandates that teams must run young drivers in Free Practice 1 sessions during the season, with two sessions per car.
The Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya is traditionally a favourite venue for the teams to tick off one of the four FP1 sessions, given that all the drivers on the grid know the circuit very well from testing and past races.
Already McLaren and Williams have announced that they’ll be putting a young driver in the car, with Mercedes following suit.
Team principal Toto Wolff revealed: “Fred will also drive Kimi’s car in FP1.
“He has been an important part of our development work with the W17 and in helping us understand how to unlock more from the package. This session is a good opportunity for him to connect that simulator work with the real car, and for us to gather another useful data point as we keep working to improve.”
Vesti last drove a Mercedes F1 car during a Grand Prix weekend at last year’s Mexican Grand Prix, putting in the laps in FP1.
He’s eager to have his first run in the W17.
“Barcelona is a very familiar track. We first ran these new cars there back in January, so it will be interesting to return after the first five months of racing and see how much performance we’ve unlocked,” said the Dane.
“It’s a high-speed, technical circuit with a mix of fast and slow corners, which always makes finding the right setup quite challenging. Tyre management will also be key, especially on the rear tyres, which tend to take a lot of energy.
“I’ll be driving in FP1, so I’m very excited to get my first taste of the W17. It is something I’ve been waiting for since the beginning of the year. I’ll also be working closely with the team throughout the weekend.”
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Mercedes head to the Circuit de Catalunya chasing a seventh successive Grand Prix win in the F1 2026 championship.
While George Russell won the opening race in Australia, it’s been all Antonelli since, with the Italian converting five successive pole positions into five Grand Prix victories.
Wolff reckons it will be interesting to see how far Mercedes has progressed since the opening pre-season outing at the Spanish circuit.
“Barcelona is a more traditional, and therefore representative, circuit; it’s a real test of a car,” Wolff said.
“It has a long straight and a mix of high, medium, and low-speed corners, so after two Sprint weekends and Monaco, it should give us a better read on our performance.
“It will be the first weekend where we can understand more clearly our recent updates and where we sit relative to the rest of the field.
“We need to see how the car behaves, whether the performance is there, and whether we can extract it. Until then, we should be careful not to draw too many conclusions from recent races.”
As for his drivers, while he acknowledges that Antonelli is riding a wave of confidence, the Mercedes team principal believes Russell has it in him to bounce back.
“Kimi will naturally take confidence from Monaco,” he said, “but the focus has to be on continuing to build and doing the job in Barcelona.
“For George, the last races have not gone his way, but that is part of racing. He is very strong mentally, we know the level he can deliver, and he has the right people around him.
“The objective is simple: reset, focus on the weekend ahead, and put together the performance we know he is capable of.”
After six race weekends, Antonelli leads the Drivers’ Championship by 66 points ahead of Lewis Hamilton, with Russell a further two points off the pace.
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Originally published by Planet F1 —
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