‘Towelgate’ hogs limelight as Antonelli goes for six straight wins

Mercedes teenager Kimi Antonelli is having to fight off Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton on multiple fronts after keeping the seven-time world champion at bay at the Monaco Grand Prix last weekend. The Italian won his fifth straight race on the street circuit and as the Formula 1 bandwagon arrives for the Barcelona-Catalunya Grand Prix this weekend, the story that has been doing the rounds on social media has been of the 19-year-old also having to deal with a sneak attack from Hamilton’s girlfriend and reality star Kim Kardashian, who was caught on camera 'stealing' his official winner's podium towel to wipe away sweat before walking off with it.

Antonelli, though, chose a light-hearted approach to address the post-race drama. Rather than showing public frustration over his missing gear, the teenage prodigy and the Mercedes team took to social media to track down the asset via a comical sketch. In the video, a seemingly perplexed Antonelli is seen sitting in deep thought before directly asking the camera, 'I was wondering, have you seen my towel?'

The video even features a cameo from his Mercedes teammate, George Russell, who asks if anyone had 'seen Kimi's towel?' Before the clip cuts to black, Antonelli is filmed washing his hands, repeating the line, 'Have you seen my towel?'

While it is too early in the season for his opponents to throw in the towel yet, Antonelli goes into Barcelona looking for his sixth straight win in seven races. Already the youngest championship leader in F1 history, he could become only the sixth driver to claim six straight wins and so equal pre-season favourite and teammate Russell's career total.

The race in Barcelona takes place on the same circuit where Max Verstappen announced his arrival by winning in 2016. Just like the present day, Mercedes had arrived in Catalunya as the team to beat, only for their duelling title protagonists Hamilton and Nico Rosberg, who took the 2016 title and promptly retired, to collide and exit on the first lap. That gifted the 18-year-old Red Bull debutant a memorable first win with the two Ferraris driven by 2007 champion Kimi Raikkonen and four-time champion Sebastain Vettel second and third.

For that to happen, however, the Milton Keynes-based team will need to recover from the power unit failure that ended Verstappen's race on the grid In Monte Carlo when starting from second and regain the speed shown in Montreal where the four-time champion finished third. As for Mercedes, something similar – remember Antonelli and Russell had clashed in Canada – is not impossible, though not desirable.

Antonelli's astonishing rise has given him a 66-points lead ahead of a revived Hamilton, who is chasing a first win for Ferrari after two seconds in Canada and Monaco. He shares the record of six wins at the Barcelona track with Michael Schumacher and has every reason to hope for a seventh.

Russell is third on 88 points – 68 behind his teammate – and bewildered by his slump in fortunes, as demonstrated by the fiasco of speeding penalties and pit-stop bungles in Monte Carlo. "I'm in a very weird state of mind," he said. "I've never had a run like this..."

His fragile confidence will welcome Mercedes' support as team chief Toto Wolff confirmed. "It hasn't gone George's way, but he is strong mentally and we know the level he can deliver... The objective is simple – reset, focus and perform."