Kimi Raikkonen confessed he was feeling frustrated after posting the second fastest time during Saturday’s qualifying session a mere 0.027 seconds behind pole sitter Fernando Alonso.
The McLaren-Mercedes driver however, automatically receives a ten position grid penalty, for changing an engine and will now start from12th place.
“It’s frustrating having to change engines and incur the 10 place penalty again, but we showed in France last weekend what is possible,” he said optimistically.
“There is nothing I can do but get on with things, push as hard as possible and hope our strategists got things right. The lap was okay, but I ran a bit wide in one of the quick corners. Also, as the engine failure happened early in the second session, I was unable to run with new tyres then which made things more challenging during my flying lap. In racing anything can happen and we will do our best and hope for an exciting Grand Prix.”
Raikkonen’s challenge however, may have been compromised after Juan Pablo Montoya could only manage fourth quickest and unless the Colombian can squeeze in front of the two front runners, he will not be able to slow the grid up enough for his team-mate to play catch up.
“It was an okay lap time. I could have been one or two tenths quicker, but was a bit careful coming into the first corner because of the wind and all of a sudden lost a lot of grip when I turned in at Becketts,” he explained.
“However the rest of the lap was pretty good and I pushed like crazy. Qualifying is important here at Silverstone and whilst it’s a disadvantage to be out early, I still managed to get on the second row and I hope it will be a strong race for me.”
