Australian GP 2014 Qualifying thread

[radosav]

'I was playing around with the switches' - Raikkonen

Kimi Raikkonen said his crash during qualifying for the Australian Grand Prix was on a slowing down lap and caught him by surprise, but that there was no major.damage to his Ferrari.

Raikkonen hit the wall coming out of Turn 3 at the end of Q2 in the rain, and will begin Sunday's race from 11th position. But he played down the incident, and believes his grid position reflects his competitiveness at the moment.

"I was just playing around with the switches or something and got a little bit of wheelspin and touched the wall," Raikkonen said. "It was just one mistake. I just got a little bit of wheelspin. I wasn't pushing anymore anyhow but just got wheelspin. I just couldn't catch it. That didn't change the fact that we would not have gone through anyhow.

"I think we had some speed, but it was just the traffic, so obviously with those things it's a bit tricky. I didn't have any more time to do an extra lap [when I spun] so I would have come in [the pits] anyhow."

Raikkonen revealed he is having difficulties with the car this weekend.

"Overall we probably struggle a bit on our set-up. We knew that already from testing. We are waiting for new stuff that we want to try. Unfortunately that will not happen overnight."

Raikkonen said the parkland circuit was particularly difficult to drive in the wet.

"It seems to be tricky here for some reason. For some reason when we come here it doesn't turn out to be nice weather. It can be like it is now or sunny like it was yesterday. That's how it is. Tomorrow is another day."


He even got time to play....

He gave similar interview when he was driving Mclaren and his car was very good. They asked him how is it driving at the front ( as race leader ). He said something like: '' It was boring! I tried to amuse myself by pressing buttons and playing around switches, got carried away with it and at the next moment i found myself missing braking point! ''

[Nero Horse]

Just finished watching qualifying. What on earth were the team thinking? Sending out Alonso out on intermediates in Q3 at the start when every single team and driver were out on wets? The track was too wet! That was a very bad call. It's not like the conditions were changing making it difficult to call. This is not the way to start the season. Terrible strategy. Alonso was lucky not to crash. Also sending out Alonso in Q1 on the mediums when a lot of cars were on the softs was a little risky. If the rain arrived a little bit sooner than it actually did, Alonso going out again but on softs wouldn't have improved and possibly would have been out of Q1! If you listened to the radio transmission by the team when they told him to come back to the pits you could sense some tension.

I'm sure that Alonso told the team which tyres he would like to use. In these wet, tricky situations it's always the driver who needs to tell his engineers what the track conditions are like and what tyre he wants to use. It's all a one team, not drivers and the team separately.

[Hornet]

I'm sure that Alonso told the team which tyres he would like to use. In these wet, tricky situations it's always the driver who needs to tell his engineers what the track conditions are like and what tyre he wants to use. It's all a one team, not drivers and the team separately.

The rain came after Q2, so the drivers are not out there to report back the conditions.

[Katu]

can anyone please open the race thread.. an hour to go until the start

[Nero Horse]

The rain came after Q2, so the drivers are not out there to report back the conditions.

Maybe so, but I'm sure that Alonso had a say in this decision.

[DIEK]

He gave similar interview when he was driving Mclaren and his car was very good. They asked him how is it driving at the front ( as race leader ). He said something like: '' It was boring! I tried to amuse myself by pressing buttons and playing around switches, got carried away with it and at the next moment i found myself missing braking point! ''