One started from pole.
The other from nineteenth on the grid.
One had two wheels and an Italian Aprilia underneath him.
The other had four and a Mercedes.
One raced through the Tuscan hills of Mugello.
The other through the trees of Monza.
Three months apart.
Two different sports.
And, in the end, the same image.
An Italian rider or driver crossing the finish line first in his home Grand Prix.
In May, it was Marco Bezzecchi.
Today, Andrea Kimi Antonelli.
There are victories worth championship points.
And then there are victories that, for a few minutes, seem to belong to more than the person who earned them.
🇮🇹 Preferisci leggere l’articolo in italiano? Leggi qui la versione completa.
May. Mugello shouts 72
Marco Bezzecchi arrived at Mugello as the MotoGP World Championship leader.
He was Italian.
He was riding an Italian motorcycle.
And he was starting from pole.
That already felt like enough to place the weight of an entire home Sunday on the shoulders of the #72.
Then the race began.
Bez lost and regained the lead, waited, studied what was happening in front of him and, on lap 14 of 23, took first place back for good at San Donato.
From there, he disappeared.
He won ahead of teammate Jorge Martin, completing an Aprilia one-two and giving the Noale manufacturer its first ever MotoGP victory at Mugello.
For Marco, it was his first win at the circuit.
For Aprilia, too.
And Bezzecchi became only the sixth Italian rider to win the Italian Grand Prix at Mugello in the premier class, joining Loris Capirossi, Valentino Rossi, Andrea Dovizioso, Danilo Petrucci and Francesco Bagnaia.
But that Sunday, the numbers almost felt like the least important part.
There was an Italian.
On an Italian motorcycle.
At the Italian Grand Prix.
And when he crossed the line, he was emotional.
We wrote then that there are places where winning changes the weight of a victory.
Mugello was one of them.
Today, Monza reminded us that it is not the only one.
September. Kimi in Monza. Nineteenth at the start. First at the finish.
Andrea Kimi Antonelli’s weekend appeared to have chosen a very different script.
He arrived at Monza leading the Formula 1 World Championship, already with six victories in 2026 and a 59-point advantage over George Russell.
But an engine-related grid penalty meant that, despite qualifying seventh, he would start his home Grand Prix from 19th place.
So the expectation changed.
Limit the damage.
Fight through the field.
Take as many points as possible.
Then Sunday happened.
A race interrupted after Charles Leclerc’s heavy crash brought out the red flag. Then restart. And then a recovery through the field.
George Russell ahead.
And eventually, first place.
Antonelli won at Monza.
And in doing so, he became the first Italian to win the Formula 1 Italian Grand Prix since Ludovico Scarfiotti in 1966.
Sixty years.
At home.
At Monza.
One from pole. One from P19.
Perhaps that is where the comparison becomes most beautiful.
Because these two victories hardly resemble each other at all.
Marco had clear track ahead of him.
Kimi had eighteen cars.
Marco was racing for an Italian manufacturer chasing its first win at Mugello.
Kimi was driving a Mercedes in the place where Ferrari red usually means more than anywhere else.
Marco built his weekend from pole.
Kimi had to rebuild his from the back of the grid.
Even the circuits seem to tell two different versions of Italy.
Mugello rises and falls through the hills, flowing from one corner into the next.
Monza runs through the trees and seems to ask one simple question over and over again: how late are you willing to brake?
They are not the same story.
They do not need to be.
The common ground comes only at the end.
When the visor opens, the engine noise stops being only engine noise.
When, for a moment, it is no longer Aprilia or Mercedes, MotoGP or Formula 1.
It is home.
The colour of the bike, the colour of the car — and then the flag
Bezzecchi’s victory had an almost perfect symmetry to it.
Italian rider, motorcycle and circuit.
Antonelli’s tells a different story.
Monza is a place where red carries a meaning unlike almost anywhere else.
But today, a Ferrari did not win.
An Italian in a Mercedes did.
And perhaps that says something beautiful about the way we follow riders and drivers.
There are moments when the colour of the fairing or the car matters enormously.
Then there are moments when, for a few seconds, it moves into the background.
Because you recognise one of your own.
Not because they are somehow required to “win for Italy”.
But because you understand what it means to do it there.
On that day.
In front of that crowd.
Two Sundays 2026 will hold onto
In May, Marco Bezzecchi won at Mugello.
In September, Kimi Antonelli came from 19th on the grid to win at Monza.
The 2026 season has placed those two images inside the same year.
And we still do not know where either story will end.
Marco continues to fight for the MotoGP World Championship.
Kimi leads the Formula 1 standings and today added a seventh victory to a season that had already given him six before arriving at Monza.
But some things are already clear.
Mugello and Monza are not alike.
A MotoGP bike and a Formula 1 car ask completely different things of the person driving them.
Marco and Kimi are at different stages of their careers and have travelled very different roads.
And yet, in 2026, they have both done something very few people ever get to experience.
They won at home.
In May, Mugello shouted 72.
Today, Monza shouted Kimi.
And on two different Sundays, three months apart, the sound of motorsport in Italy felt strangely familiar.
Because sometimes home is not simply where you start.
It is not only where you return.
Sometimes home is the place where you cross the finish line and, for one moment, it feels as though all that noise is shouting your name too.
LINK:
Leggi: “Hai capito che cosa ca**o hai fatto, Bez? Hai vinto al Mugello!”
Guarda: F1 a Monza, l’ultimo giro della gara con la storica vittoria di Kimi Antonelli
