F1’s Youngest Ever Polesitter Is Rated Second-Worst in F1 25 Game

Driver ratings for this year’s F1 25 video game have been revealed, and we have some questions. Chief among those: How the heck did Kimi Antonelli, Formula 1‘s youngest ever polesitter and Lewis Hamilton’s replacement, get ranked second from the bottom?

For those unfamiliar, these driver ratings essentially quantify how well each driver performs in the game, distilling qualities and hierarchies that are mostly nebulous in real life into cold, hard numbers out of 100. “Combining historical sporting data, recent performances, and consultation from TV commentators and pundits, each driver’s rating influences how their AI performs when racing alongside them on the track,” reads an EA blog post.

Overall ratings are a composite of four factors (Experience, Racecraft, Awareness, and Pace), with the latter said to hold the most weight.

F1 heads on Reddit and X will surely have even more to say about the rankings, but the score that jumped out to us most is Antonelli’s 72, placing him second from the bottom. In real life, the Mercedes newbie is far and away this season’s most successful rookie, currently sixth in the driver championship standings and having qualified on pole at last weekend’s Sprint race in Miami. At just 18 years old, this makes him the youngest person to ever start an F1 competition at the front.

So, excuse our incredulity when EA Sports and developer Codemasters’ algorithm deems him an inferior driver to *checks notes* Alpine’s Jack Doohan, who just yesterday was replaced by Franco Colapinto and demoted back to reserve driver duty mid-season after scoring no points over six races (and breaking lots of cars). Sure, it is tricky to get this sort of thing right for rookies who have little historical data to work off of. But still, you’d think a pundit or commentator consulted on this would have read the room and said something.

Another point of potential contention will likely be the fact that Carlos Sainz is ranked ever so slightly higher than seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton on the back of supposedly superior racecraft and slightly better pace. For context, Sainz was effectively booted from his seat at Ferrari starting this year to make way for Hamilton. Carlos is a good driver, for sure, but better than Lewis? C’mon now.

While the above ratings will be the same when F1 25 launches on May 30, “they will be updated periodically throughout the year, dynamically changing based on real–world performance.” F1 25 will be playable on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series consoles, and PC.

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