‘My Mum really cares about it’ – Antonelli on balancing F1 with schoolwork as rookie reveals his least favourite subjects

Kimi Antonelli has detailed the challenge he is currently facing in trying to balance his F1 career alongside completing his school work, with the 18-year-old looking to find a time to complete his final exams amidst his busy schedule.

After passing his driving test just weeks before making his Formula 1 debut for Mercedes, Antonelli now has another off-track achievement to tick off the list as he embarks on his final year of school.

And while fitting this in during his first season in the sport is proving tricky, the Italian is hopeful that he will eventually be able to finish his last examinations.

“I have the last year of school [to do],” Antonelli told The Fast and the Curious podcast. “I have final exams, so I’m trying at the moment to fit [in] a date where I can do it, which is pretty difficult at the moment.

SUZUKA, JAPAN - APRIL 06: Andrea Kimi Antonelli of Italy driving the (12) Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 — Antonelli is busy competing in his debut F1 season for Mercedes – but still has school work to complete

“I’m getting a lot of help from school, I’m not going to lie – they’re sending me stuff over, but it’s a big commitment. To be honest, I always say I don’t really want to do this, but when I think back it’s important as well.

“I’ve been doing so many years of school and it would be a shame to just quit on the last year of school, and also my Mum really cares about it, so I will do it for her as well.”

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When asked how he is going about his education – given that he is unable to physically attend school due to his work schedule – Antonelli explained: “I do it online at the moment.

“I go to a public school, so I can’t really connect during the day because they don’t really do that, but after each lesson they send the material of what they’ve been teaching in class, and also my classmates help me as well.

“But definitely it’s tough, and especially this year it got a lot tougher. I couldn’t keep up that much this year because obviously everything intensified massively, but I’m trying to finish it.”

In terms of the subjects that he least enjoys tackling in-between F1 commitments, Antonelli admitted that Maths is not something he looks forward to.

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“It’s a terrible feeling, I’m not going to lie,” the teenager said. “Maths, you start off, you see numbers and then you get to see just letters, and I’m like, ‘Oh my god, why am I doing this?’ It’s something I have to do, but it is a really difficult subject.”

He continued: “My favourite subjects are English, because I know it very well and I don’t have to study it, and then I like PE – you just play around. These are my two favourite subjects.”

Pushed on whether he receives any help from team boss Toto Wolff with his homework, Antonelli responded: “No. I don’t really talk with Toto about it. He knows it’s important as well, but he never really helped me – but I never even asked him [for] help for school.”

When it was put to him that fellow Mercedes driver George Russell might be useful in assisting him with Maths homework, the rookie joked that he would asked his team mate about this during the recent Japanese Grand Prix weekend.

“If I find him on the plane, I’m going to go over [to] him and ask him to help me with math and see how we get on!” Antonelli said with a smile.