Piero Vivarelli, a Bologna-based yoga teacher who once raced for the team of Marco Antonelli — father of Kimi Antonelli — is among the authors of “Lezioni di Yoga,” a 30-volume collection published by RCS MediaGroup and on sale in Italian newsstands since September, Zazoom reported. In an interview published by the Corriere di Bologna, Vivarelli detailed how he walked away from a motorsport journalism career to teach yoga full-time, and explained why he believes he understands what makes Kimi Antonelli so fast.
The connection is what makes the story travel beyond Bologna. Vivarelli did not merely meet the Antonelli family; he drove for it. He raced in the Italian Production championship — in a Peugeot, as he told the Corriere di Bologna — for Marco Antonelli’s team, and he describes Antonelli senior as a close friend. On Sunday, he wrote to congratulate him. The two had already resumed messaging during this season, after years without contact, to exchange compliments as the young driver’s campaign progressed.
From desk job at an auto magazine to a mat in 1994
Vivarelli’s first career was motorsport media. In the 1990s he was head of the editorial desk at an automobile magazine. His passion for engines, he told the Corriere di Bologna, is what had carried him into journalism in the first place — and, in parallel, into racing for Antonelli’s squad.
The turning point came in 1994, when Caterina — who later became his wife and the mother of his son — introduced him to yoga. He began with commitment, then traveled to India and to the United States as a student to study the discipline. Meditation, he said, changed the way he saw himself and the world, and pushed him to read, study and go deeper.
Two years in an Indian ashram, then a 2005 decision
The timeline, as Vivarelli laid it out to the Corriere di Bologna, runs in clear steps. In 1997 he moved to India for two years, living in the ashram of his guru, his spiritual guide. There he began practicing with real discipline and completed his first teacher training — a course he took only because he was asked to, he says, since he never imagined he would teach. When he returned to Italy in 2000, he started teaching friends at home.
He went back to his newsroom desk for a salary — “a salary to live on is necessary,” he noted — but the teaching kept growing. In 2005, five years after his return, he made the call: he left journalism entirely to dedicate himself to teaching yoga. That decision is why his name now appears alongside other prominent Italian teachers in the RCS collection, and why he is described by the Corriere di Bologna as the only Bolognese master in the series.
| Year | Milestone in Vivarelli’s career |
|---|---|
| 2000 | Returns to Italy; begins teaching friends at home while resuming journalism |
| 2005 | Leaves journalism to teach yoga full-time |
| September 2026 | “Lezioni di Yoga” collection, 30 volumes, launches in newsstands with Vivarelli among the authors |
Vivarelli's national platform keeps Antonelli brand momentum alive
- The timing of the interview lands after Kimi Antonelli’s recent performance, keeping the Antonelli name in the Italian news cycle and sustaining commercial momentum around the brand that Marco Antonelli built from his workshop in Croce di Casalecchio.
- The RCS collection’s newsstand model — 30 volumes rolled out from September — gives Vivarelli a national publishing platform, expanding his reach well beyond his Bologna teaching base.
- Vivarelli’s dual credibility — a former racing driver and motorsport journalist commenting on the driver — positions him as a distinctive voice in the ongoing conversation about driver mindset and preparation in F1.
Why Vivarelli says he understands Kimi’s strength
Vivarelli never met Kimi Antonelli, but he says he knew how strong the boy was from an early age — and he attributes it to knowing Marco’s story. Marco Antonelli ran a workshop in Croce di Casalecchio that Vivarelli describes as fantastic, and his path in guiding his son's talent was, in Vivarelli's words to the Corriere di Bologna, linear and he was very good at following his son's talent; handling the racing world as a parent, Vivarelli stressed, is genuinely difficult.
The family is present, and knowing Marco, none of it surprises him. Asked whether he could picture the driver as a yoga practitioner, Vivarelli said he can easily imagine a mind capable of meditating and turning inward. He did stop short of the word itself, noting that what top athletes mostly use are techniques derived from yoga rather than yoga as such.
What Vivarelli says yoga actually is
One of the interview’s sharper clarifications: separating yoga from meditation is, in his view, an absurdity. Meditation, he told the Corriere di Bologna, is the principal practice of yoga, and the physical exercises — the asana — exist to support it. His own site, pierovivarelli.it, frames the same idea in practical terms: in the first ten minutes, beginners of every age and background begin to perceive their body and breathing in a new way, and ten minutes, he writes, “give you a new experience of yourself.”
Where the outlets differ is in emphasis. Zazoom compressed the story into its headline hook — the racing past, the Antonelli link, the changed life starting from a mat. The Corriere di Bologna delivered the full interview with the career timeline and the family detail. Vivarelli’s own site supplies the teaching philosophy the news items leave out. Together they explain why a 30-volume national collection wanted a Bolognese former racing driver and motorsport editor as one of its authors.
Marco Antonelli’s own moment in the spotlight
Vivarelli’s tribute lands as Marco Antonelli is himself giving interviews. In remarks reported in related coverage carried by Zazoom, Antonelli urged keeping feet on the ground and said no driver wins without a great car — a notably sober assessment from the father of a driver, and one that echoes the managerial steadiness Vivarelli credits him with.
The next dated marker on record is the collection itself: the 30 volumes of “Lezioni di Yoga” continue their newsstand rollout from RCS MediaGroup, the publishing run that began in September and that put Vivarelli’s name — the man who swapped a race seat and an editor’s desk for a mat — into Italian homes week after week.
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