Now that the World Rally Championship season is more than
halfway over, we caught up with Finnish star Kimi Raikkonen to see how
he rates his progress up to now…
What do you think of your results so far this year?
“I’d say that our results are what we expected; or maybe slightly better
than we expected. When we came into this year, we knew that it was not
going to be easy and it would take us some time to adapt and of course
this has been the case.
If you consider that everyone else has got so much more experience
than us and we had not even done five rallies before the start of the
year, it’s not too bad.
Sweden was a tricky event for us to start the year with as the grip
kept on changing but then we found it a bit more normal on gravel in
Mexico. Jordan was a really tricky rally but we were very pleased to
take our first points, and then we had Turkey where we finished fifth,
which was a great result.
After Turkey we missed Rally New Zealand and then we had Portugal,
which was difficult for us because it took a little bit of time to get
into the rhythm again. When we went to Bulgaria I had a good feeling on
asphalt and if we had not had an accident, then I think we could have
been in the top five.”
How about Finland?
“Actually, Finland was the same sort of story as Bulgaria: some good
bits and some bad bits. But it would have been top eight and not top
five.”
So how many marks would you give yourself out of 10?
“I’m not sure: I would say maybe five? Because some bits have been good
and some other bits have been not so good but in the end it was all more
or less what I was expecting. OK, maybe we have done a bit better than I
was expecting, so I could give myself five and a half or six?”
Making pace notes has been a big challenge. How is that going?
“That’s probably one of the hardest things for me. Even when I was in
Formula One I never really liked it when engineers were talking to me
over the radio when I was driving the car in the circuit. Now though it
is part of the job. There is probably more speed to come from me through
improving the pace notes than there is in any other area.”
Rallying is a slightly mad sport. Does it ever scare you?
“No, there is nothing that I am scared of in a rally car: it is just a
very different style of driving. In the end you have to trust your
co-driver and your pace notes because this is part of the skill of
rallying.
Having said that, when you go off on a circuit, you normally go off
into a gravel trap or a tyre wall. When you go off in rallying there are
trees. There is no room for mistakes, and although I am making a few
all the time, this is one of the things that attracts me to rallying. If
it was easy, then everybody would do it.”
Have your targets changed at all this year?
“No, not really. I just want to gradually improve and learn everything
you need to succeed in rallying. It’s unrealistic to expect much more in
your first year as rallying is all about experience.
The chances are that I’m not going to be able to win anything this
year but if I could have one or two more results in the top five then
that would be really good. But I think it’s going to be tough…”
FUCK ISRAEL 