Business as usual for title leader Raikkonen

F1 News

Date: 21/March/2013

It’s a case of business as usual for F1 World Championship leader Kimi Raikkonen as the Lotus driver leads the way into this weekend’s second round at Sepang in Malaysia.

The Iceman, who more than lives up to his name when speaking to the media, took his Lotus to a surprise victory by way of a light-footed two-stop strategy in last Sunday’s Australian round.

That has put the Finn, World Champion in 2007, top of the standings by seven points from Fernando Alonso - the driver who replaced Raikkonen at Ferrari in 2010 - with Red Bull’s reigning triple Champion Sebastian Vettel currently third.

“For sure the team had some celebrations,” said Raikkonen of his surprise Melbourne victory, achieved from seventh on the grid. “But it was just one race and hopefully at the end of the year we can have a good celebration.

 “We won’t do anything different this weekend than we did in the previous race or last year.”

While Michael Schumacher floundered on his F1 return, Raikkonen - who spent two years rallying following his Ferrari exit - finished third in the Championship for Lotus in his comeback season.

The 33-year-old continues to build a cult following among die-hard F1 fans for his blend of masterful performances behind the wheel and no-nonsense approach out of the cockpit.

Raikkonen’s “Leave me alone, I know what I’m doing” radio message to an anxious engineer while on his way to victory at Abu Dhabi last year, can be found printed on t-shirts.

And there was little chance of Raikkonen getting dewy-eyed when asked about returning to the Sepang Circuit when he claimed his very first F1 victory, with McLaren, in 2003.

“It’s not really any special place” he replied. “I mean, of course it was nice to win the first race, but we really should have won the year before.

“I don’t enjoy the heat and the humidity but the circuit is nice. It usually gives a good race and that’s the main thing. Hopefully we can have another good weekend and score good points.

“Last year we were pretty good when it was hot, but obviously we haven’t run in these kinds of conditions this year. The winter has been very cold, so I have no idea. But if it’s anything like last year we should be OK.”

Alonso won last year’s race, with Raikkonen finishing fifth.