Kimis British GP review

Slipping & sliding but leading

We didn't win the British Grand Prix, but, for sure, we didn't loose too much,either. Obviously it was again very difficult race for us. We expected itwouldn't rain that much after our first pit stop. But it did and we were outthere with totally wrong tyres for those nine ever-lasting laps.

I don't know, but propably I haven't driven a F1 car in a more difficultsituation. It was really difficult on used wets in that pouring rain. I wentvery slowly, indeed, but still again and again the car was aquaplaning all overthe place. You couldn't do anything else, but wait and hope, that it wouldn'thit anywhere and you could go on again.

Once again it was a matter not giving up. Obviously we managed to go ahead andafter getting the control of the car again, we started to catch people, too. Itwas a nice feeling coming back to fight for the points and to improve ourposition so quickly.

It was good battle against Fernando Alonso for the fourth place. Obviously itwas an important point to gain, but I couldn't risk too much. Finally I got himand I was happy to finish the race with the result we had.

Putting everything in a context it could have been much worse. We had thewinning speed in the car, no question about that, but we made a wrong decisionbefore the first pit stop.

We discussed about it and according to our information the rain should havebeen only for a couple of minutes. We chose not to change the tyre and thatwas it.

The rain came almost immediately and I had to slow down in such a dramaticway. Obviously I felt the rain lasted for ever.

Actually the whole weekend was difficult. We felt the car was very good intesting, but somehow it felt so different on Friday. We managed to get itbetter for the qualifying, but once again the wind made it very tricky outthere in Q3. I was happy to start third.

I had a good start. I was looking for a place to overtake both Kovalainen andWebber, but then Mark moved to the left and I had to back off, because therewas nowhere to go. Hamilton had a strong start and I lost one place to him.

Then before the first pit stop we had the best speed of the whole weekend andeverything seemed to be working well. But the dark clouds came again and thatwas it.

Picking up five points and tieing now the leading position in the championshipgave me a good feeling. Having four successive races like we have had and stillkeeping up there with the leaders is giving a real boost for us.

The main thing is we can move on and focus on next race without any kind of apanic. We know our car is a winner. We just need to have a weekend without anymajor problems.

Now we test for the German Grand Prix in Hockenheim. I have never driven aFerrari there and it will be a new experience. But, like I have said, our caris strong for every circuit.

We will strike back again!

Click here for the Official Kimi Raikkonen web site - designed and built by Racecar


Related Motorsport Articles

84,569 articles