quote2017 Italian GP: Kimi Raikkonen reaction and impressions after FP1 and FP2
Scuderia Ferrari Finnish driver Kimi Raikkonen is confident the Maranello team will be able to further improve after a somewhat difficult day at their home track, Monza. The Italian side struggled to match rivals Mercedes’ pace in the opening day’s practice sessions for the 2017 Italian Grand Prix, but Kimi is confident things can go better when it matters the most, on Saturday and most importantly in Sunday’s race.
While his German team-mate Sebastian Vettel was 0.140s down on Mercedes driver Valtteri Bottas at the end of the second practice session on Friday, Kimi Raikkonen was almost four-tenths off the pace. After Lewis Hamilton topped the timesheets on Friday morning, Bottas’ 1:21.406 was five hundredths of a second quicker than his teammate in the second session. Just like this morning, the Maranello team finished third and fourth in Free Practice 2, with Sebastian Vettel posting a 1”21’546 and Kimi Raikkonen lapping in 1”21’804. During the session the two Ferrari drivers ran different tyre programmes, fitting the Soft and Supersoft compounds, while running various different fuel loads.
Kimi and Sebastian were well clear of the rest of the field with the Red Bulls of Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo over a second off the best time. However, the Finn was heard complaining about the balance of his SF70H car after an off late in the day: “Not really front end, just better balance overall. It wasn’t an easy day. We have some work to be done tomorrow but you know it is the normal story.” – the 2007 Formula One champion said at the end of the second practice session, as reported in the afternoon by Italian national sports newspaper based in Rome Corriere dello Sport.
Asked whether he believed Scuderia Ferrari would be able to maintain the impressive form that saw them challenge Mercedes last weekend at the Belgian Grand Prix, which took place at the Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps, Kimi answered: “We will see tomorrow. It is the first practice so times are time but we don’t know what people are doing. But to be honest it didn’t feel very easy for me today so I am sure we can improve a lot tomorrow.” – Kimi Raikkonen concluded.
For today the forecast was a dry day. And we had so much rain, that they delay the FP3 for 45 minutes and the quali over 2,5 hours! Momo? What are the Italian weather frogs smoking?
The quali was really bad. First they started it, after Grosjean crashed we had a delay over 2,5 hours. But at least it ended today Seems Ferrari has a big problem in the wet But the forecast for tomorrow is a dry race. But with the reliability of the forecast I have my doubt
POS DRIVER CAR LAPS GAP 1 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 53 1h15m32.312s 2 Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 53 4.471s 3 Sebastian Vettel Ferrari 53 36.317s 4 Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull/Renault 53 40.335s 5 Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari 53 1m00.082s 6 Esteban Ocon Force India/Mercedes 53 1m11.528s 7 Lance Stroll Williams/Mercedes 53 1m14.156s 8 Felipe Massa Williams/Mercedes 53 1m14.834s 9 Sergio Perez Force India/Mercedes 53 1m15.276s 10 Max Verstappen Red Bull/Renault 52 1 Lap 11 Kevin Magnussen Haas/Ferrari 52 1 Lap 12 Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso/Renault 52 1 Lap 13 Nico Hulkenberg Renault 52 1 Lap 14 Carlos Sainz Toro Rosso/Renault 52 1 Lap 15 Romain Grosjean Haas/Ferrari 52 1 Lap 16 Pascal Wehrlein Sauber/Ferrari 51 2 Laps 17 Fernando Alonso McLaren/Honda 50 3 Laps 18 Marcus Ericsson Sauber/Ferrari 49 4 Laps - Stoffel Vandoorne McLaren/Honda 33 Retirement - Jolyon Palmer Renault 29 Retirement Drivers' standings
POS DRIVER POINTS 1 Lewis Hamilton 238 2 Sebastian Vettel 235 3 Valtteri Bottas 197 4 Daniel Ricciardo 144 5 Kimi Raikkonen 138 6 Max Verstappen 68 7 Sergio Perez 58 8 Esteban Ocon 55 9 Carlos Sainz 36 10 Nico Hulkenberg 34 11 Felipe Massa 31 12 Lance Stroll 24 13 Romain Grosjean 24 14 Kevin Magnussen 11 15 Fernando Alonso 10 16 Pascal Wehrlein 5 17 Daniil Kvyat 4 18 Stoffel Vandoorne 1 19 Jolyon Palmer 0 20 Marcus Ericsson 0 21 Antonio Giovinazzi 0 Constructors' standings
POS CONSTRUCTOR POINTS 1 Mercedes 435 2 Ferrari 373 3 Red Bull/Renault 212 4 Force India/Mercedes 113 5 Williams/Mercedes 55 6 Toro Rosso/Renault 40 7 Haas/Ferrari 35 8 Renault 34 9 McLaren/Honda 11 10 Sauber/Ferrari 5