Mercedes' Kimi Antonelli has yet to officially clinch the 2026 Formula 1 world championship, but he has a 123-point lead with 125 points left up for grabs over the final five races of the season.
Him clinching is a formality at this point, just one year after he was beaten handily by teammate George Russell and many F1 fans felt he was at risk of losing his ride.
Sunday's United States Grand Prix at Circuit of the Americas (COTA) eliminated three of the five drivers who still mathematically had a chance to challenge him. The eliminated drivers include Red Bull's Max Verstappen, Ferrari's Charles Leclerc, and McLaren's Lando Norris.
The elimination of Norris, who fell from 139 points to 154 points behind with his fifth place finish as Antonelli collected his ninth win of the season, marks the earliest elimination for a reigning Formula 1 world champion since the value of Grand Prix wins was boosted from 10 to 25 in 2010.
Lando Norris is the earliest eliminated reigning F1 champion in 28 years
You have to back to 1998, before Norris was even born, to find the most recent instance of the reigning world champion being eliminated with five or more races remaining in a season.
That year, 1997 world champion Jacques Villeneuve was elminated with five races left on the schedule.
1998 and 1999 world champion Mika Hakkinen wasn't eliminated until there was one race left on the 2000 calendar. 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, and 2004 world champion Michael Schumacher wasn't eliminated until there were four races remaining on the schedule in 2005.
2005 and 2006 world champion Fernando Alonso wasn't eliminated until the 2007 season finale. 2007 world champion Kimi Raikkonen wasn't eliminated until there were two races left on the schedule in 2008, and 2008 world champion Lewis Hamilton wasn't eliminated until there were four races remaining on the schedule in 2009.
2009 world champion Jenson Button wasn't eliminated until there was one race left in 2010, and Sebastian Vettel won the title in 2010 and added three more in 2011, 2012, and 2013.
Even the winless Vettel wasn't eliminated until there were just four races remaining on the 2014 schedule. 2014 world champion Lewis Hamilton won the title in 2015 before being eliminated in the season finale by Nico Rosberg in 2016.
This list obviously excludes 2017, when 2016 world champion Nico Rosberg did not return after unexpectedly retiring just a week after winning the 2016 title. Hamilton won the world championships in 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020, and he wasn't eliminated in 2021 by Max Verstappen until the final lap of the season.
And most recently, Verstappen then won the 2022, 2023, and 2024 titles, before battling with Norris all the way down to the wire in the 2025 season finale.
A reigning world champion has not been eliminated with more than five races remaining on the schedule since 1992, when 1990 and 1991 world champion Ayrton Senna was eliminated with six races left on the calendar.
This list also obviously excludes 1992 world champion Nigel Mansell, who did not return in 1993, and 1993 world champion Alain Prost, who did not return in 1994.
Antonelli is set to have a great chance to clinch the world championship on Sunday, November 1 in the Mexico City Grand Prix, which is set to be shown live on Apple TV from Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez beginning at 2:55 p.m. ET.
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