Kimi Raikkonen, Ferrari, Shanghai International Circuit, 2018

“I could have gone faster” – Raikkonen

2018 Chinese Grand Prix

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Kimi Raikkonen said he could have gone quicker during practice in China after being beaten to the fastest time by just seven thousandths of a second.

The Ferrari driver was pleased with his car’s performance after finishing second to Lewis Hamilton on Friday.

“I could have gone faster but I had traffic,” said Raikkonen. “We could push in all the places, so over one lap it seems to be OK.

“Obviously we’ll see in qualifying for everybody, but on the long run it’s tricky to say where we are because it started to rain.”

Ferrari has brought more of the ultra-soft tyres to this race than its rivals but the tyres degraded quickly in practice. All the teams had to make their tyre selections for this race before testing began.

“Obviously we had to make that decision quite early, not really knowing what would be ideal but I think we should be fine and don’t feel we are in any way limited,” said Raikkonen. “We know what we have and we’ll make the best out of it.”

After another strong Friday practice showing Raikkonen said he is eager to start delivering similar results in the races.

“I’m really quite happy with the feeling of the car but if the race results would have been better than I would be happier.

“It doesn’t matter who’s fault it was, if you don’t get points, you don’t get points, and the only reason we’re here is to get points. Being quick in practice is nice but we want to finish the races in the positions we think we deserve.”

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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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30 comments on ““I could have gone faster” – Raikkonen”

  1. It is definitely interesting that Kimi seems to get the car dialled in quickly on Friday, this year. Let’s hope it continues through to qualifying and the race at least this time around!

  2. “I could have gone faster” should be the title of the section of his autobiography covering his second stint at Ferrari…

    1. I love the guy, but i was thinking the exact same thing.

    2. @geemac
      That’s exactly what I thought when I read the title!

  3. I hope he wins. Tbh, I feel if he just gets a win, we might see him get his momentum back. I really don’t know why people think he’s slow and he should retire. Last few seasons have been a disaster for him but I have never heard him be this happy with his car before. I feel he has the potential to be a contender this year. Only problem is he’s got a 4 time world champion as his team mate who’s backed by the team. If somehow he starts being up there in all the races I think he can still be in the fight. And of course he can still be on the grid next year too. Yes he’s old and he’s boring during interviews..but he is a class driver..I feel he is still quicker than few young’s ones who are on the grid.

    1. why should drivers keep getting a chance when under performing? to me Kimi has underperformed since 2006 and mainly from 2007. strange that Ferrari re signed him when they did, I’m guessing because they knew he was consistently only fast enough on little occasions, and that he would be a great no. 2 driver, which he has turned out to be at Ferrari 2nd time around.

      1. To you he’s been underperforming since 2006 @kpcart. Others disagree. But you’re a genius of course and the bosses of Ferrari and Lotus and millions of other people are clearly stupid. All bow to Prof. kpcart!

      2. kpkart: please define “under performing.” Kimi Räikkönen is statistically the driver (behind only Schumacher) with the highest number of fastest laps in the history of F1, ahead of Prost, Hamilton, Vettel… so would you agree that he is a fast driver?

        Fast drivers lose races for many reasons: technical errors, malfunctions and breakdowns; stupidity and bad days; team orders; and plain bad luck.

        I’m not trying to make any excuses for Mr Räikkönen. I’ve never met him, don’t know him. I’m a tad disappointed (perhaps like many others) that he’s only been WDC once, and was only 4th last year (this year is maybe too early to tell with a 3rd and a DNF from another possible 3rd, but his quali times have been pretty good.) So, again, — and relative to this year’s field of twenty drivers — how is he “under performing”?

  4. I’m liking how dialled in Kimi is at the start of this season. I thought he beat Sebastian fair and square in Australia, but got unlucky. If his Q3 lap wasn’t impeded in Bahrain, he would have probably started on pole. He seems quicker than Seb from the get go here as well. He just needs to have one clean weekend to get his rhythm back.

    1. There is an onboard showing that he was barely impeded in his q3 final lap.

      1. Michael (@freelittlebirds)
        13th April 2018, 19:15

        Well, he was heading into corners with a slow car and ended up passing the car after a corner but he didn’t know that… The reason he caught him out of the corner might because he dialed it down.

    2. @todfod Hulkenberg and Sainz weren’t even on the racing line when he passed them, so he didn’t have to lift off earlier because of their presence.

      1. I haven’t been able to find his onboard, but he mentioned it in a post quali interview that he was unlucky to get traffic.

    3. Alexander Nicklisch
      13th April 2018, 16:03

      I guess ‘if only’ conjectures are an integral part analyzing and appreciating F1 performances, but ignoring certain facts while doing so reduces these discussions to little more than spinning a narrative – in this case, if I remember correctly, Kimi was already trailing Seb before being impeded so pole was not so probable…

      that’s not to take anything away from Kimi’s good performances so far…

    4. so you are only judging melobourne, and qualifying in Bahrain… yep that tells you heaps about this seasons kimi… lol

      1. We are only 2 races down. What else can I judge him on? It’s a heck of a lot better than his last 3 season starts.

    5. @todfod Outrageous comment again!!! Just kidding. I agree with what you have said of Kimi. Every word ;)

          1. That was funny!

    6. @todfod
      Vettel has already set the virtual pole lap of Bahrain in his first attempt. He was 0.038s slower than Raikkonen after sectors 2 and he only needed to repeat his Q2 S3 time of 22:098s to be on pole by 0.004s.
      Raikkonen on the other hand set identical S1&S3 times in his both Q3 laps (S1: 28:052s and 28:047s ; S3 : 22:190s and 22:191s) which suggests that the impeding didn’t cost him the pole.

  5. I’d love to see Kimi putting it together and putting pressure on Vettel

  6. Something seems to have changed. Pure speculation, but maybe if he knows or has decided this is his last season, he feels no ‘pressure’ to be the Ferrari number two this year.

  7. YEEEAAAAAH!! Finally he decided to win another WDC!

  8. Could of would of should of. Sounds like something from McLaren or Ricciardo.

  9. It’s been 10yrs since his title..I feel he might end up snatching the title this year in the end from Lewis and Vettel Just like 2007 style and retire😎

  10. Very funny how some people are acting like Raikkonen is any faster now. He has always been putting top times in practice sessions for years. Vettel doesn’t care about that. He doesn’t even push for Q2 quite obviously. Vettel always turns out to be faster in qualifying or at the very least in race. By a considerable margin too…

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