Mercedes breaks silence on Antonelli wheel failure
Toto Wolff confirms the car goes back to the factory as Kimi Antonelli's title lead shrinks to just 25 points.
Mercedes has broken its silence on the wheel shield failure that wrecked Kimi Antonelli’s British Grand Prix. Toto Wolff has confirmed the team will strip the car down to find answers, while also revealing just how close Kimi Antonelli came to winning the race outright.
In this article
What actually broke on Antonelli’s car
Antonelli had enjoyed a brilliant Saturday at Silverstone, winning the sprint and taking pole position. Sunday looked even more promising. At Silverstone, Antonelli was running second, with a significant tyre life advantage on leader Charles Leclerc, when the Italian started experiencing severe handling issues with his Mercedes W17.
The Italian went on the chase of Leclerc, but this came undone when he experienced an issue with his car on Lap 41, which the team suggested was a left front wheel shield failure. Replays suggested Antonelli’s wheel shield was damaged when he ran over the exit kerb at the high-speed Copse Corner. However, the Italian pointed out he did not drive any differently to any other laps through that turn.
The damaged bodywork did not just impact the car’s aerodynamics. It also started to interfere with the mechanical suspension, which immediately affected the car’s handling. The team called Antonelli in twice to try and remedy the issue, which was eventually diagnosed as a broken front-left wheel shield.
Wolff was blunt about the root cause. “It looks like it’s a brake duct, caketin, wheel shield, but something got stuck in there, that’s why it wasn’t able to turn,” Wolff said. Mercedes is now taking the whole car back to the factory to fully understand what happened and why it had such severe consequences.
How the penalty made a bad day even worse
That safety car remained until the end of the race, so Antonelli crossed the line in ninth place but had picked up a five-second time penalty for track limits abuse caused by going off track due to the wheel issue. A late Max Verstappen crash caused the safety car, which bunched the field up, making Antonelli’s five-second penalty even more impactful on his result.
Antonelli fumed on team radio: “That’s a joke. I didn’t do it on purpose. The car was broken, I wasn’t even gaining time!” His frustration is completely understandable. This was, plainly, a survival situation. Sky Sports F1 legend Martin Brundle said on the live broadcast: “Track limits are a performance penalty not a survival penalty.”
Read more about the chaotic finish to the race in our full Verstappen crash and Antonelli failure Silverstone report.
Why Mercedes won’t challenge the stewards’ decision
Initially, Wolff hinted the team might try to get the penalty removed. In the end, they decided against it. After investigating the issue internally in its post-race debrief, Mercedes accepted Antonelli’s penalty was justified because of the sheer number of off-track excursions.
The FIA race stewards wrote: “It was evident that Car 12 left the track at Turn 6 on Lap 44 without a justifiable reason. This was the driver’s fourth track limits infringement of the race. The Stewards accepted that Car 12 was experiencing a mechanical issue. However, that did not amount to a justifiable reason for leaving the track. In accordance with the Penalty Guidelines, the standard penalty for a fourth track limits infringement during the race is a 5-second time penalty. The Stewards therefore imposed the standard penalty.”
Antonelli accepted the ruling with grace. “These are the rules, so I cannot do anything about it, but of course, I was trying my best to stay on track. To get a penalty for that, it hurts, but these are the rules.”
What it means for the title fight
The consequences for the championship are significant. Antonelli’s once-comfortable championship lead has been slashed from 65 points following last month’s Monaco Grand Prix, to just 25 in the space of three races. Both George Russell and Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton remain very much in contention for this year’s title, with Sunday’s race winner Leclerc also providing a timely reminder of his ability to take points off all three drivers.
“That would have been an epic end of the race,” Wolff said. “He would have caught Charles six laps to the end with a huge tyre offset. But you know, it’s a mechanical sport. These things can happen.”
Wolff points the finger at Mercedes reliability
The Antonelli wheel shield failure British GP is not a one-off problem for Mercedes. It is part of a worrying pattern. Two battery-related issues in Canada (for Russell) and Spain (for Antonelli) cost the team a combined 36 points earlier this season. Wolff was direct: “Generally, we just had too many DNFs and lost two second places and now one victory. Other than the top car that we have, and the great driving, that is the predominant issue.”
“It’s on us. A car should not break,” Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff told Sky Sports F1. The team will now head to the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa needing both a technical investigation and a clean weekend. You can follow every twist in the 2026 drivers’ title on our F1 championship standings page.
