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Andrea Kimi Antonelli secured his eighth victory of the Formula 1 season, triumphing at the Spanish Grand Prix held on Madrid's brand-new semi-street circuit.
The Italian's win in the Spanish capital came courtesy of a timely Virtual Safety Car (VSC) deployment, triggered by Lance Stroll's car being in a dangerous position. This temporary neutralization of the race allowed Antonelli, along with many other drivers, to make 'cheap' pit stops, saving them significant time.
Conversely, race leader Lando Norris missed out on this advantage, having already passed the pit lane entry when the VSC was announced. By the time the world champion completed another lap, Stroll's car had been cleared, and the race resumed, forcing Norris to pit under green flag conditions.
Ultimately, Norris finished third, behind Antonelli and Max Verstappen. Post-race, there was widespread agreement that the Briton deserved to win, but fate simply wasn't on his side. Days later, Mercedes revealed they had used a "secret code" in their communication with Antonelli, who intentionally slowed his pace even before the neutralization, ensuring he didn't miss the pit entry.
"Well, we use a secret code to hint that they might want to pit if there's a Safety Car. But we try not to let other teams learn these codes, so we change them every week," stated Andrew Shovlin, the Silver Arrows' chief engineer, on the NU Silver Arrows Radio Show podcast. "There was a yellow flag, which Bono (Peter Bonnington, Antonelli's engineer) confirmed. Kimi eased off slightly, giving himself an extra second... It might have worked without it, but it certainly made things easier.""If you watch the onboard footage from his car, you'll see it wasn't easy to get into the pits. You'll see that as he was stopping for service, the tires were still coming out of the garage, so it was tough to execute that stop in such a short timeframe.""On Sunday morning, our focus was on being ready to react to any incident. For that, we need to be sure what we'll do at every moment of the race, whether it's a Safety Car or a Virtual Safety Car. This is normal; all teams operate this way.""But even with a plan, there can be moments of discussion. There's a wondering if we want to do this. The good thing in this case was that we had a plan. Kimi knew he was in the window to pit under a Virtual Safety Car. Bono confirmed it as soon as there was an incident," Shovlin added.
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