Antonelli's title run, mapped

Formula 1 tore up its rulebook for 2026: new engines, new aerodynamics, a new car. The first team to make the new formula work has been Mercedes, and the driver leading the championship is the one who replaced Lewis Hamilton in their car at eighteen.

After the Singapore Grand Prix in mid-October, Kimi Antonelli led the 2026 drivers' championship with 340 points, 102 clear of his teammate George Russell, with Hamilton third for Ferrari and Max Verstappen fourth for Red Bull. Mercedes led the constructors' championship from Ferrari, McLaren and Red Bull, by Sky Sports' count. Six races remained.

This is a map of the places behind that lead.

Bologna: where it started

Antonelli grew up near Bologna, in San Lazzaro di Savena, and came up through Mercedes' junior programme. When Hamilton left for Ferrari at the end of 2025, Mercedes put the teenager in one of the most sought-after seats in the sport rather than sign a proven name. A year on, that seat is at the top of the standings.

Brackley and Brixworth: where the car is built

A Formula 1 championship is a team's as much as a driver's. Mercedes build their chassis at Brackley, in Northamptonshire, and their engines about thirty miles away at Brixworth. The new 2026 power unit, split roughly half-and-half between the engine and its electric side, is the part the whole grid had to get right; the two English factories got there first.

They are not the only new engines on the grid. Audi has taken over the Sauber team and builds its own power unit at Neuburg, in Bavaria, and Cadillac has joined as an eleventh team. Both are near the foot of the table in their first year.

Melbourne to Abu Dhabi: the season's stage

The season opened in March at Albert Park in Melbourne and runs to Yas Marina in Abu Dhabi in December, with a new street race in Madrid added to the calendar along the way. Between them lie the circuits where the lead was built, among them Monza, Antonelli's home race, where an Italian driver leading the championship for a German team drew the biggest crowd of the year.

Singapore, in October, was where the gap reached 102 points. On the map the run stretches most of the way around the world, from a town outside Bologna to two factories in England to a night race in the Gulf; whether it ends with a title will be settled in the six races still to come.