Mercedes driver Kimi Antonelli has been involved in a crash near his home in San Marino, with the F1 teen damaging his £180,000 brand-new company car in the process.
The incident happened on Saturday night on the San Marino highway, near Serravalle Castle.
Thankfully the 19-year-old emerged from the accident unscathed but reports in San Marino state there were multiple collisions over a vast distance – indicating that it was at high speed.
According to San Marino TV the first collision occurred against a traffic pole on one side of the road. From there the car was thrown towards the centre of the road, hitting the guardrail twice before crashing into a retaining wall on the opposite side.
They add that the trajectory of the crash was 144metres, with the police now investigating.
In a short statement, Mercedes confirmed the incident and that their driver is unharmed: ‘Last Saturday evening, near his home in San Marino, Kimi was involved in a road accident,’ their statement began.
F1 star Kimi Antonelli was involved in car crash near his home in San Marino on Saturday night. He crashed his £180,000 Mercedes company car – which he was only given to him days before
Antonelli emerged unscathed but reports detail that the trajectory of the crash was 144metres
‘The police attended the scene after being called by Kimi. His was the only car involved and, although the vehicle sustained damage, Kimi was completely unharmed.’
The accident comes less than a week since Antonelli was given his new company car, which was shared on Mercedes’ Instagram channel.
He was handed a Mercedes AMG GT 63 PRO 4MATIC+ ‘Motorsport Collectors Edition’ – an extremely limited version with just 200 produced. The standard version costs £180,000 and does 0-62mph in 3.2 seconds.
Despite the ordeal, the Italian will take part in this week’s Bahrain Formula 1 pre-season test as planned.
He is scheduled to drive the Mercedes W17 in the afternoon of the opening day on Wednesday, followed by the morning of the second day on Thursday and again the afternoon on the final day on Friday.
