…Has the ‘real’ Kimi returned? Read your thoughts here, including mine
He was always the real Kimi. Him winning at France was no suprise. It’s
only been a matter of time, not a question of his motivation and
driving skill.
All Raikkonen proved at France was he ain’t no push over to Massa.
The McLaren drivers better watch out for the awesome championship
charge from Kimi.
Saima Evenstar Azam
London
And I’ll be at the British Grand Prix, so I look forward to Kimi trying for another win as he has begun his championship charge. I also look forward to sharing lots of photos from the track and if you see this flag, you’ll know it’s Kimi Raikkonen’s Space cheering him on!
Q & A with Kimi Raikkonen – Silverstone
…Q. At what stage in Magny-Cours did you realise the race would come to you if you continued at the pace you were going at?
KR: You only know when you finish the race. But before the
second pitstop we knew we were in a good position. Our aim was to keep
closing up and to try and make something at the second pitstop. It
worked out very well. Like I said, it is not so easy to be close to
people.
Q. You lost some points in the first part of the season. Do you now worry that you cannot afford to make any more mistakes?
KR: Not really. We try to go as fast as we can and score as
many points as possible. Sometimes you make some mistakes, sometimes
you push to the limit, but I don’t worry about it too much. We don’t
have much to lose. There are still many races to go and we only need
one bad race for the other guys and it can turn around completely. So
we just keep pushing, try and get good results like the last race and
see where we end up…
From www.itv-f1.com
Kimi VS Massa
The battle for supremacy within Ferrari’s driver line-up has been much closer than many anticipated in 2007.
Felipe
Massa’s stock has risen thanks to two accomplished victories and a
consistent points-scoring run, but is he really faster than Kimi
Raikkonen? Expert analyst Mark Hughes looks at the facts.
Kimi
Raikkonen’s return to winning form for Ferrari in France saw him
produce the sort of error-free, consistently-on-it sort of drive he’s
been failing to deliver since Bahrain, the third race of the season.
Ever since that event – where he left an open door on the first lap
that Fernando Alonso walked through, then was later half-asleep on the
restart behind the Safety Car – his races have been compromised by
little lapses.
At Barcelona he lost a crucial place off the grid, at Monaco he made
an inexplicable error in Q2 on Saturday that restricted him to
mid-grid, in Canada he damaged his wing at the first corner against the
back of team-mate Felipe Massa, at Indianapolis he again lost crucial
places off the grid.
In two of those races – Bahrain and Spain – Massa took consecutive beautifully accomplished victories.
So
the perception built that Massa was ‘blowing away’ the man who prior to
this year had the unofficial tag of ‘world’s fastest driver’.
But actually it hasn’t been like that.
Raikkonen’s shortfall this year has not been one of raw performance,
but of sharpness, of making the right instinctive moves in the
competitive heat of the moment.
The underlying speed behind the little errors that have proved so costly has been very much there.
In fact, the last time that Massa was genuinely faster through a weekend was in Malaysia, the second race of the year.
In fact, that was the only time Massa had been faster all year
until, ironically, France – where Kimi won, aided by a better strategy.
The
idea that actually Raikkonen has been overall the faster Ferrari driver
is very much against the perception and so will take some explaining.
The picture has been skewed by differing fuel weights in the top-10 run-off sessions, but let’s look at it race by race…
Australia. No comparison possible, because of Massa’s gearbox
problem in Q2 that kept him out of the run-off. Raikkonen took a
dominant pole and win but his team mate was out of the picture. Speed
score: Raikkonen 0, Massa 0.
Malaysia. Massa was quicker all weekend, by a couple of tenths.
Felipe made a Horlicks of trying to pass Hamilton and so Kimi got the
result. But in terms of speed Maasa was the man. Speed score: Massa 1,
Raikkonen 0.
Bahrain. Both of Raikkonen’s new tyre qualifying runs were baulked
by traffic. So no comparison possible. Speed score remained therefore
at Massa 1, Raikkonen 0.
Spain. Massa was on pole, Raikkonen only third but there was
absolutely nothing between them once fuel weights were taken into
account. We didn’t get to see this play out because Raikkonen retired
before his first stop. But team members confirmed that he’d been
fuelled three laps heavier than Massa. Score remained Massa 1,
Raikkonen 0.
Monaco.
Raikkonen made that bizarre error in Q2 that damaged his suspension and
kept him out of the run-off. However, throughout the weekend up to that
point he had been consistently 0.2-3s faster than Massa.
The
team confirmed that he had achieved a much better handling balance than
Massa, and wasn’t being compromised by understeer. They were deeply
disappointed with Kimi’s accident as all their data suggested he would
have been pushing the McLarens for pole. Remember, we’re only talking
performance here. Kimi was the quicker Ferrari driver and only his
accident and compromised starting position disguised it. Running score:
Massa 1, Raikkonen 1.
Canada. Raikkonen qualified ahead – despite a fuel load one lap heavier. Running score: Raikkonen 2, Massa 1.
USA. Massa qualified ahead but by less than the amount he should
have done, given his lighter fuel load. Running score Raikkonen 3,
Massa 1.
France. Massa’s pole was still half a tenth quicker than Raikkonen’s
lap when you fuel-adjusted for Kimi running three laps more fuel.
Running score: Raikkonen 3, Massa 2.
The shortfalls in Raikkonen’s performances have been not raw speed but apparent concentration lapses.
He’s not been prone to these at any other time in his F1 career, and as such the suspicion must fall to his fitness levels/
But in France, he was flawless.
He used his heavier fuel strategy to beat Massa, but it required
that he beat Hamilton off the start and that he then stayed close
enough to Massa to be able to use his three low fuel laps to advantage
each time Massa stopped.
He did each of these things to perfection. What he desperately needs
to do now is build on that, make that sort of consistency the norm that
it used to be. Then we’d have the Kimi Raikkonen that Ferrari signed.
Let’s wait and see.
FUCK ISRAEL 