Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsFerrari

Raikkonen seeks answers after 'pretty disastrous' qualifying

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Kimi Raikkonen says he needs to understand what is causing his qualifying problems after a "pretty disastrous" session at the Monaco Grand Prix.

Having crashed in FP3, Raikkonen comfortably progressed to the final part of qualifying before a slow first run left him out of position. Raikkonen's final lap left him sixth on the grid - with the two Red Bulls between him and third-placed Sebastian Vettel - and he admits it's a poor result in Monaco.

"I had a pretty okay first lap and I had one more lap and then there was a Toro Rosso so I had traffic on the second lap," Raikkonen said. "I came in because I was too slow already and obviously it was pretty disastrous. The car felt okay but it was hard to get heat in the tyres. The end result is what it is and we will try to do a good race tomorrow."

And Raikkonen says he needs to work out why he struggles so much during qualifying compared to Vettel.

"It’s difficult because obviously tomorrow’s race is going to be tricky. We seem to manage to get it wrong every race, so we need to work on something to try to improve it. We don’t put ourselves in very good positions for Sundays and obviously it makes our races difficult.

"Obviously when you are stuck behind you spend time trying to get past cars and then you miss out on the fight at the front. But it’s part of the game."

Click here for Saturday's gallery from the Monaco Grand Prix

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.