SUZUKA — Mercedes’ Kimi Antonelli won the Japanese Grand Prix on Sunday for his second straight victory, as the 19-year-old Italian became the youngest driver in Formula One history to lead the world championship standings.

Antonelli took advantage of a mid-race safety car to leapfrog into the lead after a dreadful start from pole position and led home McLaren’s Oscar Piastri by 13.722sec with Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc a further 1.548sec back in third.

He whooped with delight as he crossed the line at Suzuka, telling his team “the pace was unbelievable today”.

He moved up to 72 points and leads the championship by nine points after three races, building on the first grand prix win of his career two weeks ago in China.

“Of course it’s still too early to think about the championship but we’re on a good way,” said Antonelli.

“I don’t know what would have happened, what the outcome would have been without the safety car, but it definitely made my life a lot easier.”

His Mercedes teammate George Russell finished fourth to drop to second in the championship standings on 63 points. Leclerc is third on 49.

Russell battled Piastri for the lead over the first half of the race but pitted just before the safety car which dropped him out of contention for the win.

Piastri secured second in his first grand prix start of the season, after crashing on his way to the grid in the opener in Australia and missing the race in China because of a technical problem.

Piastri led for the first half of the race before the safety car gave Antonelli his chance.

“It would have been really interesting to see what would have happened without that,” said Piastri.