Kimi Raikkonen, Ferrari, Circuit de Catalunya, 2018

Raikkonen: “If we want to go faster we can”

2018 F1 season

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Kimi Raikkonen indicated Ferrari have more performance in hand after heading the final day of pre-season testing.

Team mate Sebastian Vettel set the fastest overall time of testing on Thursday with a lap of 1’17.182, which Raikkonen got within four-hundredths of a second of on his last day in the car.

Esteban Ocon, Force India, Circuit de Catalunya, 2018
Pictures: 2018 pre-season F1 testing day eight
But Raikkonen said it doesn’t represent the ultimate performance of the SF71-H. Asked if he expects to be in contention for pole position in Melbourne he said: “We’ll see in two weeks.”

“I’m sure if we want to go faster we can go but it doesn’t mean anything here. In two weeks everybody knows where everybody is. Until that we are only guessing like we were before the testing started.”

Raikkonen was pleased to achieve some meaningful running in the car following the disruption to the first test due to weather.

“Obviously we didn’t have a very good test because of the weather last week,” he said. “But I think we had a pretty decent last day.”

“The feeling was OK. But is that good enough, we’ll see in a few weeks. So far the car is reliable, the feeling is fine. There’s always things to improve, that’s going to be the case every year we are using the car, it’s nothing new.”

“Obviously testing is not that big a part as it used to be,” he added. “But racing is why we are here.”

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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15 comments on “Raikkonen: “If we want to go faster we can””

  1. Kind of sums up his career…

  2. wow, those are long answers for Kimi’s standards, were they put together?

  3. Kimi interviews… dreadful as always. “We’ll see”, “you never know”, “it doesn’t mean anything”, “bwoah”

  4. Kimi, i truly love you. But i will not get up my hopes. I just don’t think i could take this kind of rejection…

  5. Looks like Kimi has the best engine in Melbourne. Let’s hope Ferrari obey the new regulation giving Haas exactly the same engine AND software. Holding back Magnussen from overtaking him and replacing him in his team, will force Kimi to drive better than ever before.

    1. There are some analysis suggesting that the Ferrari engine is quite thirsty. Hopefully that’s not the case. I’ve also read on twitter that Ferrari didn’t bring the latest spec PU which may have contributed to higher fuel mileage (they had the same issues last year) and supposedly with the latest spec they don’t have that issue anymore. If that is true why would Ferrari not bring their latest spec engines to winter testing? Doesn’t make sense. Please note: the whole PU thing could certainly be fake news.

      1. Also theres analysis saying Merc eat their tyres and Red Bull may simply not be fast enough……you can pick about 10 different stories that are all different from so called experts across the world.

      2. I don’t believe they had such fuel usage issues last year, as they were always stronger in the race than in qualifying. That wouldn’t have been the case had this rumor been true.

  6. Nothing is ever good enough for Kimi. It’s always just ‘eh ok’ or ‘we can be better’.

    1. Interviewing him is always a waste of time. He doesn’t even produce the funny soundbites anymore.

  7. Does anyone really believe that Kimi likes testing? On the other hand, I’ll bet Seb loves it. He’s such a nerd…

  8. Raikkonen want go faster can.

  9. “I’m sure if we want to go faster we can go but it doesn’t mean anything here. In two weeks everybody knows where everybody is. Until that we are only guessing like we were before the testing started.”
    Kimi´s words. I agree.

  10. Michael (@freelittlebirds)
    11th March 2018, 15:07

    He sounds like a man who’s hungry to win championships and to compete. Just kidding, where’s the payroll department?

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