'Quite a messy day' for Raikkonen leaves Ferrari pace unknown

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Kimi Raikkonen says Ferrari's pace is still unknown after he had "quite a messy day" of practice ahead of the Austrian Grand Prix.

The Finn suffered a spin early in FP2 which saw him having to recover from the escape road on the outside of the circuit. Soon after, heavy rain struck which resulted in no running during the middle of the session, with the track not drying fully until the final 20 minutes. Raikkonen admitted the disjointed afternoon leaves him unsure where Ferrari stands this weekend.

"Obviously it was not ideal, it was quite a messy day but that’s how it is sometimes," Raikkonen said. "I think we have a good feeling but for sure things would have been a lot more straightforward in normal conditions, it would have made it easier.

"I don’t know [where Ferrari is], it’s pointless to start guessing anything. We will see tomorrow where we are. Obviously we didn’t have very clean sessions with the weather and everything, it could have been better but obviously the weather impacted quite a bit the second practice but that’s how it is.

"We only really got so many laps done with the conditions. So for sure it’s a bit unknown but it’s not too bad."

One area of contention among the drivers is the new exit kerbs which damaged Max Verstappen's car in FP1, but Raikkonen has no concerns over the additions this year.

"There’s always kerbs, it doesn’t matter which colour they are. It’s a normal kerb and there are kerbs at every circuit, so…"

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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.