When was the last time Kimi did a great job in a car that didn't look likely to win a single race? Despite two or three stunning drives I don't think he did a great job in 2002 or 2009, and would describe 2006 as decent at best given the motivation of his first teammate and ability of his second. I'm not criticising him for that, because barring two or three stunning drives per season the same could be said about Schumacher, who I still believe will come good if Ross Brawn gives him a car. But I have very little confidence in Renault's ability to challenge next season.
I hope their car is good enough to challenge occasionally for a podium, so at least Kimi can prove his worth. Like the 2010 Renault car.
The 2003 Ferrari was not the fastest car. Admittedly Raikonnen had some rotten luck with reliability but he had the faster car
2003: Schumacher 93Pts Raikkonen 91Pts Brazil: Before Roll Back: Raikkonen 10 Pts Fisichella 8Pts Alonso 6Pts After Roll Back: Fisichella 10Pts Raikkonen 8Pts Alonso 6Pts
They are becoming ever so frequent. Which is positive, but the team need to sort out reliability and overall pace of the car.
The 2008 Ferrari was a lot stronger than that and he lost out to Massa in that. Unless his mind is in the right place, and I think a race-winning car is paramount to that, he's more likely than not going to flop.
Schumi's return has been underwhelming to say the least. Kimi's mightn't be much better though dependent on his 'mindset'. I expect he'll quali well, unlike MS, though.
When people have previously discussed a potential Kimi Raikkonen return to Formula 1 and in the last few days how it will actually go, a lot of people come to talk about motivation and hunger and say it isn't there, they mainly point towards 2008 + 2009 and say he drove awful seasons then having already become world champion. Ignoring 2008 I'd like to just talk about his 2009 season, for me he was one of the best 3 drivers of the year along with Button and Hamilton. (thats just my opinion!!) Ferrari like McLaren had just spent every last moment developing the 2008 car to death right up to the last race in 1 of the closest fought driver championships of modern times and had barely spared a 2nd thought for the 2009 model. And when it arrived it, like the McLaren, was awful and by all acounts a real handful to drive. Again like McLaren they had all the initial KERS balance issues to sort out as well instead of focusing on downforce etc. And with the testing ban it was hard to change it much. Unlike McLaren they just wrote the season off halfway through the year to focus on 2010 so the car never really got much better past that point and he was left to deal with what he had. Now lets look at all ferrari results that year. Raikkonen: 15, 14, 10, 6, DNF, 3, 9, 8, DNF, 2, 3, 1, 3, 10, 4, 6, 12 Massa : DNF, 9, DNF, 14, 6, 4, 6, 4, 3 _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ Fisichella : _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 9, 13, 12, 10, 16 Badoer : _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 17, 14, _ _ _ _ _ Okay Badoer had not raced since 1999 but he had been test driver for the 2,000's and done thousands of miles every year up till 2009 so he wasn't comletely rusty, but he certainly looked like a civillian. He may be a grey area but then there is fisi. Fisi had been racing in F1 since 1996 and had been racing for force india up till Monza and had at the previous round gotten their 1st ever pole, points and podium so he certainly wasn't out of touch but he could not score in it either. Massa in 2008/9 was one of the best drivers in F1 at that point IMO and ferraris golden boy at the time (how times change), and his results were not much of an improvement on Raikkonens in the 1st half of the year. So this all shows it was a dog of a car and a real handful, yet he got their 1st podium at the traditional drivers circuit. After Massa was out I believe he could then get free reign a bit more over the car as the new lead driver and then ferrari really was carried by Kimi back to some salvation with a run of 4 podiums with a win. Plus a further 2 point scoring finishers at the end of the year. Despite them no longer developing the car. I would say he was very motivated and driving that car to positions few other drivers in the world could have gotten it to. I don't think 2009 can be used as a reason to say he wasn't that great or his motivation wasn't there. I think he put in a blinding performance that year. what are your opinions on his 2009 season?
As soon as the Ferrari turned into a decent challenger in 2009 Kimi proved his value, some of his drives were fantastic.
he did an OK job. Massa was better by far however and that was the only time he had a true teammate comparison that year. That will always leave the level of his performance slightly unknown.
In all honesty, I'm not particularly good at remembering the details of past seasons. I tend to get them confused and am grateful for the reminders I get in a forum like this - when someone else does the research for me! I think it's called 'laziness', so I'm very thankful to Sea-Man for producing this article, and look forward to refreshing my memory through its responses over the next few days! Cheers. ©
Just going off topic on my own thread for a sec, does anyone else remember ferrari's laughable mistake that year when, I think it was spain, Massa was running 4th-ish and they told him he didn't have enough fuel to finish and he had to go into major fuel saving mode and he was dropping like 5 seconds a lap to fit into the predicted level of fuel saiving required to finish the race. he dropped about 30 seconds by the flag. So he dropped several places and after the race ferrari realised they had read the telemetry wrong and had enough fuel the entire time.
Aah yes. Now I am beginning to remember that season. The season after losing to Hamilton at Brazil? I think Massa was doing very well - probably better than Raikkonen actually. Let's remember Ferrari have a soft spot for Massa as a long-suffering servant. At the time, I believe they would have liked nothing better than to see Massa as their all-conquering hero, even above the guy they were paying a lot more for! My opinion of Raikkonen was that he became disinterested and is actually even lazier than me! - It's a fair bet he would have difficulty remembering which year he won his title (cosi also scratches head at this pointâ¦)
The way I rememeber it, Massa was doing a much better job than Kimi that year, it was only after Massa got hit on his head that Kimi came good. No idea why, maybe the team where giving Massa better equipment but I don't think so. Sea-man, from what I rememeber of the fuel saving that year was that the sensor was wrong, and they where being told wrong infomation from the car. These things happen from time to time. I also do think that Ferrari do have a soft spot for Massa, he has been a long-suffering but loyal servent for Ferrari for years. However they are still a professional team, and if Kimi was faster than Massa over the year then they would of supported him. He wasn't faster than Massa in either 2008, or the first half of 2009, and Massa was Ferrari's number 1 driver during that time.
Apologies to sea-man for not dealing specifically with 2009 but, for me, Raikkonen generally gave the appearance of giving up early in many races if he found himself back in the pack. I don't remember which race it was (perhaps it was in 2009) but a particular situation occurs to me in which Hamilton found himself behind Raikkonen in 15th and 16th or something. Hamilton quickly dispatched Raikkonen and made his way up into the top ten (I think). Raikkonen remained in 16th. A similar lack of ambition led to him battling with Sutil down the field on occasion. Very quick if he was leading, he always seemed to struggle to make the best of his race when he wasn't.
genji I think your thinking of Monza 2008: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsport/formula_one/9431702.stm brilliant race
