Will Kimi shine when he’s back on the black stuff?
"Kimi Raikkonen is half way through his first full season in the WRC
and it’s proved to be a steep learning curve. Will the second half of
the season give Kimi the satisfaction he wants and convince him to stay
for another season? On paper, the second half of the season should suit
him better. The fact that four of the seven rallies are on asphalt
should make him feel at home – but will his F1 car skills transfer to a
rally car? Personally, I hope he does a great job, enjoys every moment
and sets the world alight, but I think that’s a tall order. But not
everyone agrees. There are still stories on the internet and in
magazines suggesting Kimi might beat Loeb on asphalt. Come on guys, get
real. Yes we are talking about Kimi Raikkonen here, one of the fastest
drivers in the world, but the guy’s in his first year of WRC and has to
learn!"
Kaj Lindstrom’s Blog
Courtesy of Dracaena from f1zone.net
Driving with Kimi – The asphalt is hot
In the coming weekend one of the season’s most interesting and most
anticipated rallies will be driven. Rally Bulgaria is a new race for
every driver in the series and it’s the first asphalt rally of the
season. So we finally get to the proper surface: hot asphalt.
Hi all again.
A couple of weeks ago we drove a two-day finishing test which went
well. We managed to improve the car’s set-up significantly compared to
Italy. Kimi was able to try his own ideas with the set-up in peace and
with their help the car became different and clearly better and faster.
The test was all in all a very positive event and Kimi drove the rally
car nicely on asphalt. We both feel really good about taking part in
Rally Bulgaria.
On asphalt Kimi is like at home. He likes to drive a car whose
behavior is neutral and which slightly oversteers in the corners. The
main thing is that the car turns well into corners. In the tests, as
well as the test race in Italy, we were in good speed all the time.
During the coming rally we are allowed to use 40 different tires
which we have to choose from 40 hard and 20 soft compound tires. In the
tests Kimi was able to drive on such a soft driving line that our tires
wore a lot less than for example our team mate Sebastien Ogier’s tires.
Kimi’s action behind the wheel was expressionless but extremely
efficient: when he brakes he does it once and we accelerate he
immediately presses the pedal to the floor. He does nothing in vain. In
the tests it was easy to see that Kimi has driven on asphalt all his
life: the tires don’t become heated and ware as much as usually with
rally drivers on asphalt.
So the Rally Bulgaria route is new for everyone. It’s possibly also
easier to pace note since asphalt roads usually miss those crests after
which the road takes a turn into some direction. Asphalt roads are
usually more logical in nature than gravel roads: you can usually
always see from the car what is coming.
In the asphalt tests it showed from Kimi’s driving that he didn’t
have to think about the basics of rally driving anymore because on
asphalt they came from his spine. Therefore there’s one variable less
for Kimi compared to gravel. We feel confident going into the race.
Rally Bulgaria starts on Friday morning at 9 am and it ends on Sunday
at 2 pm. The centre of the rally is the city of Borovets which lies
about 100 km south of the capital Sofia. The concentrated service park
of the race lies about 25 km away from Borovets at the Dolna Banya
airport. There are 14 special stages in the rally, the combined length
of which is 354,10 km. All the special stages are asphalt covered: some
of them are in better shape on the surface, some in worse.
Let’s hope that there’s still vacation weather in Finland after a week. I’ll get back to you then.
Kaitsu
(Minna Ranki 5.7.2010)
FUCK ISRAEL 