Toto Wolff reveals how costly 'eager' Kimi Antonelli errors were in Austrian GP

Mercedes boss Toto Wolff has reflected that Kimi Antonelli cost himself a chance of victory at the Austrian Grand Prix by being overly "eager" in the opening laps.

Antonelli started from fourth place at the Red Bull Ring, losing positions on the grid after mistakenly slowing for a yellow flag, which he believed to be a double-waved yellow, a signal that would automatically have seen his time deleted.

With team-mate and race winner George Russell correctly lifting before continuing to take pole, the Italian was forced to battle past both Ferrari drivers in the opening exchanges, but this didn't go entirely to plan, as he ran off the track on three separate occasions in the opening two laps. 

"I think he was very eager at the beginning to get the victory done in the first couple of laps, and that cost him dearly," Wolff told Sky Sports F1. 

"But I like the enthusiasm, and he just goes for it up the hill there [at Turn 3], throws the anchor probably 30 meters too late. And the same thing down here [at Turn 1], and that's how it should be. 

"I've said it before, we want a driver to be full on the attack all the time rather than; you can't you can't accelerate a donkey, but you you can calm down a racehorse."

After hunting down Russell and Max Verstappen in the top two positions, Antonelli fell agonisingly short of an improved position, as he fell 1.9s short of the victory.

The result saw his championship lead cut to 40 points, with Russell moving back into second place after Lewis Hamilton finished in fifth place.

"I was a bit too excited on the first few laps," Antonelli told media, including Crash.net. "[I] definitely didn't drive well.

"I made too many mistakes, and on the first stint on the medium, I lost three or four seconds with the mistakes. I was struggling with the brakes.

"After I changed tyres, I reset, and the pace at the end was very strong. It was a shame I joined the party a bit too late.

"On my side, there's a lot to improve, but still.. minimise the mistakes."