AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Kimi Antonelli stormed to his ninth win of the season on Sunday at the United States Grand Prix and further tightened his grip on a Formula 1 season championship that he could win at the next race in Mexico City.
The Mercedes driver started from pole position at the Circuit of the Americas with an outside chance of winning the season championship outright. A victory combined with poor results from his closest rivals would have done it.
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Mercedes driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli of Italy steers his car during the Formula One U.S. Grand Prix auto race in Austin, Texas, Sunday, Oct. 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
Mercedes driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli of Italy crosses the finish line to win the Formula One U.S. Grand Prix auto race in Austin, Texas, Sunday, Oct. 25, 2026. (Dustin Safranek/Pool Photo via AP)
Mercedes driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli of Italy steers his car during the Formula One U.S. Grand Prix auto race in Austin, Texas, Sunday, Oct. 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
Mercedes driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli of Italy steers his car during the Formula One U.S. Grand Prix auto race in Austin, Texas, Sunday, Oct. 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
But Ferrari's Lewis Hamilton finished fourth and Mercedes' George Russell, who is a distant second in the standings, finished eighth to barely keep the title chase alive, sending it to the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez at the Mexico City Grand Prix.
“It was a result we needed, the whole team deserve it so much,” Antonelli said.
Ferrari's Charles Leclerc finished second, more than 14 seconds behind Antonelli. Red Bull's Max Verstappen was third.
The 20-year-old Antonelli is on the brink of becoming F1’s youngest champion in series history, and the first Italian to win the title since Alberto Ascari in 1953.
He made easy work of Sunday's race with a blistering start that blew Verstappen off the line as he eased into the first corner. The uphill left-turn switchback is one of the most notorious collision spots of the season and it was no trouble on this day.
Verstappen has struggled with his starts several times this season, and Antonelli’s blast into the first corner never gave Verstappen a chance to win the inside line. Instead, the four-time champion quickly found himself in a fight with the two Ferrari cars while Antonelli drove off into the distance and seized control of the race.
From there, it was a matter of managing the race as Mercedes watched to see where Russell and Hamilton would finish.
“Another small step,” Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff told Antonelli over the radio after the victory. “Another small step.”
The biggest one could come next week in front of one of the biggest, most boisterous crowds of the season.
Antonelli needs to finish only ninth or higher in Mexico City to clinch the championship.
“We are very close, but we try to finish on a high and we try to clinch (the title) very soon," Antonelli said.
See AP’s full auto racing coverage here
Mercedes driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli of Italy steers his car during the Formula One U.S. Grand Prix auto race in Austin, Texas, Sunday, Oct. 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
Mercedes driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli of Italy crosses the finish line to win the Formula One U.S. Grand Prix auto race in Austin, Texas, Sunday, Oct. 25, 2026. (Dustin Safranek/Pool Photo via AP)
Mercedes driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli of Italy steers his car during the Formula One U.S. Grand Prix auto race in Austin, Texas, Sunday, Oct. 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
Mercedes driver Andrea Kimi Antonelli of Italy steers his car during the Formula One U.S. Grand Prix auto race in Austin, Texas, Sunday, Oct. 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
As concerns rise about a return to an all-out Iran war ahead of crucial elections in the United States and Israel, Iran said messages are still being passed to the U.S. and Tehran remains open to diplomacy. And U.S. President Donald Trump said there would not be a strike against the Islamic Republic “today.”
Meanwhile, the International Committee of the Red Cross has begun receiving lists again of Palestinian detainees from the occupied West Bank and Gaza after the Israeli Supreme Court ordered the government to resume sharing them.
Here is the latest news from the Middle East on Sunday. Read our full coverage here.
Iran's foreign ministry spokesperson, Esmail Baghaei, said Tehran has not closed the window of diplomacy and messages are being passed to the U.S. via intermediaries. Negotiations over the war have appeared to stall for weeks.
State media said Baghaei spoke in an interview with a German broadcaster. He said the U.S. appears to persist in unilateral demands and that Trump and U.S. officials repeatedly use the phrase “complete surrender," which Baghaei said no Iranian accepts.
Concerns are rising among Iranians about a possible return to all-out war as Israel and the U.S. face elections in the coming days.
Asked if he planned to launch an attack on Iran, Trump initially suggested that he would be foolish to telegraph that.
But Trump then added: “No. There will not be a strike today.” At the same time, the head of the U.S. Central Command, Adm. Brad Cooper, was flying over the Strait of Hormuz and asserting that over 3,000 commercial vessels have transited the waterway with U.S. military support over the last six months.
Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeated his warning that Iran or its proxies could attack ahead of Tuesday’s close elections to disrupt the vote, citing intelligence.
“The (military) is ready both to defend and to strike,” he said in a video statement, adding: “You will suffer disproportionate blows far greater than you can imagine.”
Netanyahu and his military chief of staff have had a confrontation over a political directive related to Iran shortly before Israel’s close election, a local broadcaster reported Sunday night.
The Channel 12 report caused alarm among some Israelis including Netanyahu’s chief rival in Tuesday’s election, Gadi Eisenkot, who said on X he backed the chief of staff, Eyal Zamir.
The outcry reflected concerns some have raised in Israel that Netanyahu, who could lose power after being the country's longest-serving prime minister, might be eager to attack Iran ahead of the vote in an effort to stay in office.
Netanyahu described the Channel 12 report as nonsense during an appearance on another broadcaster, Channel 14. There was no immediate military comment.
The Channel 12 report did not say what exactly the Iran-related directive was. In recent days, the prime minister has asserted the need to “topple” Iran’s leadership.
The International Committee of the Red Cross has begun receiving lists again of Palestinian detainees from the West Bank and Gaza, a spokesperson confirmed.
The Israeli Supreme Court earlier this year ordered the government to resume sharing such lists and allowing the ICRC to visit detainees in Israeli prisons to assess their conditions. The government had suspended both practices since the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attacks and the start of the war in Gaza.
ICRC spokesperson Gilad Grossman said Israel had not yet allowed prison visits to begin again but “we hope that we will resume in the near future.”
Israel rounded up thousands of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza after the Oct. 7 attacks. Some were released in last year’s ceasefire, but around 9,000 are still imprisoned or detained under harsh conditions.
King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh said it opened terminals 1 and 2 for domestic and international flights, but Iran-backed Houthis in neighboring Yemen again fired drones and missiles toward the Saudi capital.
Saudi military spokesman Maj. Gen. Turki al-Malki said air defenses intercepted and destroyed a ballistic missile and a drone fired toward Riyadh. The Houthis claimed the attack.
In early October, Houthi strikes hit an airport complex housing two other terminals, killing 17 people and wounding over 330.
Saudi authorities said debris from the interception of two ballistic missiles in Khamis Mushait and Ahad Rafida governorates wounded two people, a Saudi citizen and a resident from an unspecified Asian country.
The Civil Defense said the missiles were launched by the Houthis in Yemen, and the debris also damaged three buildings and seven vehicles.
The Houthi rebels later claimed attacks that included King Khalid air base in Khamis Mushait, calling them a response to “Saudi aggression” against Yemen’s rebel-held capital of Sanaa. The AP could not independently verify the claims.
Late Sunday, the Saudi-backed Yemeni government accused the Houthis of targeting displacement camps in Ras Imran on the outskirts of Aden with three ballistic missiles, without providing details. There were no reports of casualties. The Houthis did not immediately comment.
Israeli strikes in Gaza killed seven people, according to Palestinian hospital officials.
Two strikes in Gaza City killed four people, and two brothers were killed in the southern city of Khan Younis. One person was killed in the central town of Deir al-Balah. The deaths were confirmed by officials from Shifa, Hamad, Nasser and Al-Aqsa hospitals, as well as an American field hospital.
The Israeli military did not immediately comment.
A year since a ceasefire began, Israel continues to bombard Gaza in what it says are strikes against militant targets. More than 1,500 Palestinians have been killed, according to the territory’s Health Ministry, which is part of the Hamas-run government. It does not distinguish between civilians and militants but says women and children make up nearly half of those killed.
Pope Leo XIV urged an end to the fighting in Yemen and warned of worsening conditions for more than 1 million residents of Taiz besieged by Houthi rebels.
“The population is suffering from a lack of food, water and medical care,” the pope wrote on social media. Families have begun rationing water and a shortage of groceries has sent prices soaring in the country’s third-largest city.
This report will be updated throughout the day as new developments emerge.
A man looks out over the water as a small boat passes cargo ships anchored in the Strait of Hormuz off Bandar Abbas, Iran, early Saturday, Oct. 24, 2026. (Amirhosein Khorgooi/ISNA via AP)
Israeli soldiers take up positions during an army operation in the West Bank city of Hebron Saturday, Oct. 24, 2026. A day after a Palestinian shooting attack in the area. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)
A demonstrator wearing a mask depicting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends an anti-government rally ahead of the country's general election, Saturday, Oct. 24, 2026, in Tel Aviv, Israel. (AP Photo/David Goldman)
A demonstrator wearing a mask depicting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends an anti-government protest ahead of Israel's general election, Saturday, Oct. 24, 2026, in Tel Aviv, Israel. (AP Photo/David Goldman)
Saudi-led coalition spokesman Maj. Gen. Turki al-Maliki speaks during a press conference in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Thursday, Oct. 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Baraa Anwer)
