Spanish Grand Prix – Kimi Raikkonen said that his Alfa Romeo lacked speed this weekend in Spain, which was exacerbated by a mistake on the opening lap.
The Finn started the race from P14 after a tricky qualifying session for Alfa Romeo saw both drivers fail to get through into Q3. With Raikkonen one of five drivers to attempt to start the race on the Medium tyre, he was all set to try a one stop strategy and this may have worked out better had he not made a mistake and run wide into the gravel just three corners into the race:
“It was very slippery on the Mediums, and I almost spun at Turn 3. I tried to go with it but the rear didn’t want to and I almost managed to get it stopped before the edge of the tarmac but the left wheel went into the gravel. I went off then and it took a little while to get back.”
Relegated to the very back of the field, Raikkonen plugged away and changed to the Hard tyre on Lap 28. But, with the Safety Car deployment effectively negated any possible advantage to persevering with that strategy, he came back in for Soft tyres on Lap 45.
He finished P14, right back where he started, and the Finn was pragmatic as he said the team were looking forward to the two day test at the circuit this week. He will be driving the C38 on Wednesday, with FDA driver Callum Illot driving on Tuesday.
“Good that we have two days of testing ahead. We need that and hopefully we can figure out what the problems are. Overall it was not an easy weekend for us. Pretty disappointing, but as I said, the test will hopefully help to turn things around.”
