Raikkonen admits to ‘fighting with set-up’ in Russia

Kimi Raikkonen admits he has been “fighting with the set-up” of his Ferrari SF16-H in Sochi, as the Finn failed to capitalise on rivals’ problems in qualifying for the Russian Grand Prix.

With Lewis Hamilton unable to take part in Q3 due to an ERS issue and Vettel set to serve a five-place grid penalty, Raikkonen looked primed to challenge championship leader Nico Rosberg for pole position.

But while the 2007 world champion noticed improvements on his car on Saturday afternoon, he still lost out to Williams’ Valtteri Bottas in the hunt for a front row slot.

“I ran wide in the last corner on the last lap, but I’ve been struggling all weekend to put decent lap together,” Raikkonen said. “Thankfully it was better in qualifying, but I was still fighting for front-end grip in a few places. Still, it was good enough for third place, but it will all change for tomorrow.

“There are a few corners there where I’ve been struggling a bit the whole weekend, but it the last lap things went a bit smoother in those corners even if it was not ideal. Then, of course, I went wide in the last corner, so it doesn’t help to get one place better and then make a mistake in another corner… But it could have been far worse. I’m disappointed with what happened but it’s still going to be OK for tomorrow.

“Obviously it was not ideal, it’s disappointing but I’ll be starting from the clean side of the track, in third place. I’ve been fighting with the set-up of the car the whole weekend, to make the tyres work as we want, as this is a tricky place for that. It could have been a lot worse, but we’ll try to make a good start for the race and go from there.”

Raikkonen’s last two grands prix were compromised at the start after the 36-year-old made a poor getaway in Bahrain and collided with Vettel in China. The Finn now hopes he can have a smooth opening lap on Sunday afternoon in Sochi.

Obviously we’ll try to have a clean one in the first corners. Here there’s a very good straight and if you can make a good jump off the line it might help you to be in a safer position in the first corner.

“You never know how it’s going to be, there are so many things that can happen, so we try to make good first few corners and go from there.”

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