Antonelli admits failing to capitalise on 'surprise' Mexico FP1 factor

Kimi Antonelli has admitted to he was "surprised" by the amount of grip he was afforded by the soft compound Pirelli tyres during FP1 for the Mexico City Grand Prix.

The Italian driver, who replaced Lewis Hamilton, conceded he did not use the performance available to him, in a session in which he drove within the limit of the Mercedes W15.

Having crashed out 10-minutes into his F1 debut in Monza last month, the 18-year-old "didn't want to take any risks" en route to finishing the first practice hour at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez in P12.

When asked how he felt the session went, the F2 driver replied: "Definitely much better than Monza. I drove much calmer today. I didn't want to take any risks, I just wanted to do a clean session to get some laps [in], understand the car a bit more, understand the tyres.

"I think overall it was pretty decent. I could feel I wasn't on the limit, but just because it was much choice - I just wanted to get a clean session [in].

"I was trying to build the confidence lap-by-lap... on the soft [tyre], the step [up] in grip was quite big.. I felt a lot more grip and didn't really use it because I was really surprised by the amount of grip.

"I was able to pick up the pace quite quickly. Of course, I was not on the absolute limit, but it was good."

Whilst team-mate George Russell topped the session, Antonelli came close to another early finish.

With only a matter of minutes on the board, he ran over some carbon fibre that had found its way onto the racing line down the main straight. 

The first of the session's two red flags was shown, but considerable damage to the floor of the W15 - which Mercedes was ultimately able to fix - put Antonelli's return to the track at risk.

"To be honest, I didn't really see it," the FRECA champion reflected. "It was a shame, because I got quite a bit of floor damage from it - it was quite a big damage.

"So yeah, of course it wasn't ideal, but still managed to get a few laps in the bag."