Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsFerrari

Raikkonen is 'becoming a good guy' - Arrivabene

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Ferrari team principal Maurizio Arrivabene says Kimi Raikkonen showed signs he is "becoming a good guy" with the way he treated fans at the Italian Grand Prix.

Raikkonen's future at Ferrari was confirmed for 2016 ahead of the Belgian Grand Prix, with the Finn set to enter the third season of his second stint with the team. At last weekend's race in Monza, Raikkonen spent a lot of time signing autographs for fans on the Thursday evening, and Arrivabene said he was pleasantly surprised to see notoriously monotonous driver being so engaging.

"We had several conversations and I said I know that you are a very cool guy and most probably because you are cool they like you but at least if we meet the guys – the tifosi – you have to sign and at least move your hand and say hello and possibly to smile," Arrivabene said.

"And he stuck to these instructions and I was thinking, is there something wrong here? I was happy, of course, but then I was thinking that maybe he’s becoming superstitious and he’s doing this and [for the rest of the race weekend] it’s raining.

"He’s becoming a good guy and I was pleased about that, even if I’m still thinking and when I’m thinking, I said it can’t be Kimi, it was a sosia (doppelganger) or somebody else."

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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.