Jack Wolff, 9, wins first karting championship at Viterbo

Jack Wolff clinches the X30 U10 title at Viterbo

Nine-year-old Jack Wolff, son of Mercedes Formula 1 team principal Toto Wolff and F1 Academy managing director Susie Wolff, won the IAME Series Italy Racing Formula X30 U10 championship in his first full competitive karting season. Arriving at the sixth and final round at Viterbo as the standings leader, Jack sealed the title with victory for KR Motorsport. He had taken his first championship race win in July and has also been competing against established international karting prospects in other series during 2026.

"It was good. We had a lot of wins and some bad races but at the end we fought well and we won the championship, so I'm really happy," Jack said. "From the season I did not know I would win nearly every single round, so I was really surprised that I was up there."

A KR Motorsport program already linked to Antonelli

Jack races for KR Motorsport, the operation headed by Dino Chiesa, a long-time talent scout whose work with Andrea Kimi Antonelli preceded the Italian's move toward Formula 1 with Mercedes. Earlier in 2026, ACI Sport presented KR Motorsport's program by asking whether the team was preparing "another Andrea Kimi Antonelli," naming Jack among its young drivers after he reached the podium in the WSK Super Master Series.

Toto Wolff revealed earlier this year that Antonelli himself has helped Jack with karting and follows his races. Wolff has previously explained that Mercedes began closely monitoring Antonelli when he was around nine or ten, after he had started winning races and championships, before Antonelli officially joined the Mercedes Junior Team in 2019.

Toto Wolff's cautious approach to his son's racing

Wolff has said he and Susie were initially reluctant when Jack asked to race because of the commitment and risks involved in motorsport. The Mercedes boss has tried to balance his son's competitive ambitions with keeping karting enjoyable, describing Jack's happiness as the priority rather than treating early results as evidence of a future F1 career.

He also disclosed that his heart rate can climb from a typical Grand Prix start range of around 90 to 95 beats per minute to 150 or 155 while watching his son race. The renewed attention has not changed that stance.

A Spanish Grand Prix weekend with two races to follow

The title came on the same Sunday that Antonelli won the Spanish Grand Prix for Mercedes, giving Wolff two reasons to mark the day. Speaking to Sky Italia immediately after the F1 race, Wolff said he had been tracking the Viterbo finale on live timing during the Grand Prix. In separate comments to the Austrian newspaper Osterreich, Wolff noted that Jack and the nine-year-old Johann Berger, son of former F1 driver Gerhard Berger, are already competing against each other in international karting and occasionally pushing each other forward, while joking that the rivalry extends to the fathers as well.