Rally News

[Ice-Ludy]

Thanks a lot Nikki!!!!Marcus was great with Kimi!!!

[Kriss]

Thanks Nikki for the article

http://www.wrc.com/jsp/index.jsp?lnk=10 ... eral+means

How the WRC made it home...by several means

Getting to Istanbul for Rally of Turkey, round four of the FIA World Rally Championship, was the easy part. Getting home amid the chaos brought about by the pan-European flight restrictions due to the volcanic ash cloud in Iceland proved to be anything but for the bulk of the WRC contingent.

To make matters worse, the world championship’s top teams were under pressure to make it back to base as quickly as possible in order to begin the painstaking task of preparing their cars in time to fly them to New Zealand, where the series resumes from 6-9 May.

What should have been a straightforward journey home for the truck drivers was complicated by the boat, which transported cars and equipment from Greece to Italy in an attempt to reduce the journey time by road, being delayed leaving port by several hours.

Although the works Citroen squad made it back to France by Tuesday, the factory Ford team, based in northwest England, was not expecting its transporters to return until Friday lunchtime. As a result, its mechanics were braced for working over the weekend to ensure their cars will be ready to be air freighted to Auckland in the middle of next week.

And working over the weekend will be the last thing those mechanics will want to do after enduring a 70-hour coach journey that took them from Turkey to the UK via Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, Austria, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium and France.

Throughout the week, stories of epic travel adventures emerged as the WRC community attempted to return home. Those fortunate enough to get flights from Turkey to Greece and then onto Spain - where travel restrictions were not in place - still faced lengthy journeys by road or rail. But with hire car firms charging premium prices and rail services fully booked, a number of people resorted to taking taxis or minibuses to avoid getting stranded in airport lounges.

Ford pair Mikko Hirvonen and Jarmo Lehtinen summoned some friends to meet them in Bulgaria and drive them back to their native Finland. Ford technical director Christian Loriaux caught a flight from Istanbul to Nice but then had to resort to driving to Calais and then onward to Ford’s base by road. Pirelli’s team of tyre technicians completed their journey from Turkey to Italy by bus.

Amid fears the staging of Rally New Zealand could be under threat, organisers have been monitoring the situation closely. However, with airlines reporting the majority of their schedules are getting back to normal, fears that the European-based teams won’t be able to make it the Southern Hemisphere have all but subsided.

Event chairman Chris Carr said: “I’m confident that the teams will make it to New Zealand, despite their lengthy journeys home from Turkey. All of our efforts are going to ensure that when the teams do get here, they have the best event possible. We will be ready in Auckland, on 6 May.”

[Kiki]

Thanks Nicole & Kriss!
It's a pity Kimi won't be contesting the New Zealand rally but hopefully he'll show up at the Monaco GP.

[Wolfie]

RÄIKKÖNEN: 5th POSITIONS AREN'T ENOUGH

24.04.2010 14:14



From an interview with the French Autohebdo-magazine:

- I know who big my difference to the top drivers still is. I know that at times I can make comparable times with them but I should be able to do it more often. I develop all the time but 5th position with six minutes to the lead is not what I want, Räikkönen admitted.

- I was already ahead of Federico Villagra and Matthew Wilson on a regular basis. It doesn't give me reason to be enormously happy but it's reason enough to be satisfied, Räikkönen said.

- Jordan was a terrible experience. There were corners you had to drive in blind. I felt lost. I wanted definitely to finish the rally and that's why I didn't have any other option than to drive slowly, Räikkönen told.

MTV3 - Lauri Ouvinen

[Wolfie]

ONE STEP MORE READY

Text by Marko Mäkinen/Vauhdin Maailma
April 2010

8th position and four championship-points. No other Finnish sportsman has ever been able to score championship-points in both F1 and WRC. Kimi Räikkönen has - and there's more to come.

Despite all the unrealistic expectations the media has created Kimi Räikkönen has been able to get through all three WRC-rallies almost excellently. He has now his first championship-points in the pocket although Räikkönen himself expected to score points in the autumn at earliest.

He has made mistakes and that hasn't surprised anyone, not even Kimi himself. Rally is a brutal sport where you don't get back on the road after a driving mistake. Whereas in F1 you can make an error with the driving line which will take you over the borders or at the most to the safety-area in rally again a similar judgement error creates a six-volt rolling roulette which can end the whole race like Kimi got to experience in Mexico.

Long working days came as a surprise

Of course Räikkönen was able to prepare himself beforehand for almost everything but one thing surprised even him: when it comes to time the WRC is like the Army for Officers and the F1 again the Civil Alternative Service. In rally you sleep and eat when you have time, the alarm clock goes off at 5 a.m. after which you sit in the race car for five days until the sun goes down (recce included). It's those long racing days that brought back the backpains from a couple of old F1-races that you cannot treat in anyway in rally.

Also the change of the daily routine hindered the F1-star's concentration. Kimi was used to taking refreshing naps on the F1-paddock but in rally you cannot do the same. When a 10 year old routine suddenly changes like this it cannot help but affect the vigor.

Kimi is not a quitter

With Räikkönen's performance and development it isn't a question of speed or lack of talent, it's about enhancing these into a complete ability to perform in the most efficient possible way.

Yet Kimi hasn't even once regretted his decision to switch over to rally. You can see from everything that rally is exactly what he wants to do at the moment. If Räikkönen would have a quitter's nature or if he would be satisfied with the first good feeling then he surely would have stepped right in the helicopter in Rally Sweden when he drove in the snowbank but instead he started shoveling with a small plastic shovel to get his car out of the bank and continued his race after working for half an hour.

Kimi's main goal this season has been to finish rallies and drive as fast as possible. Other quarters have set harder result goals but Räikkönen has wisely stated that 'if you can't finish the rally then it's useless to put any other goals for yourself'.

In Jordan Räikkönen dropped his pace to a safety-level so that he could finish the rally. It was a professional man's humble performance to drive for the end result and it brought good starting points to lift up his own pace in the next rallies so that it's more closer to the topdrivers.

KIMI DRIVES WITH LOEB'S SETUPS

Kimi Räikkönen made his WRC-career's first big decision during Rally Sweden's first service break when he changed his setups so that they matched Sébastien Loeb's. With this decision Kimi wanted to concentrate more on driving from the notes and put the car's setup-matters at the side.

Loeb's suspension- and power transmission -setups don't naturally go along with Räikkönen's driving style but he humbly decided to learn a new driving style. Period.

The learning still goes on. Räikkönen made the only exception for Jordan's first stage where his starting position was 10th. They expected the road to be cleaned of rocks and sand before Kimi's turn came, that's why Citroen's suspension was changed into a remarkably harder one than the others had. This decision turned out to be completely wrong: The road's surface was even more slippery than it was for the first cars so it wasn't any wonder that Kimi said after the stages that it was his motorsporting career's most difficult and challenging race.

After the trial Räikkönen went back to Loeb's suspension estimations and he will trust them in the future too.

[Anelise]

Thanks Nicole!!!
Always a great job!!

[Kinga]

Thank you, Nicole!

[luieluv]

Thanks wolfie... Superb stuff

[Acropolis]

Nicole (I suppose it is you, Wolfie...) thanks so much!!!!

You and some other guys work so hard for us, bringing so much info, pictures, great videos etc...

You are the backbone of all this forum that brings all Kimi fans together...Thanks again...

[luieluv]

yeah Nicole Rocks...

[Moominpappa]

Nicole (I suppose it is you, Wolfie...) thanks so much!!!!

You and some other guys work so hard for us, bringing so much info, pictures, great videos etc...

You are the backbone of all this forum that brings all Kimi fans together...Thanks again...

I agree this

[KIMBO1]

Nicole (I suppose it is you, Wolfie...) thanks so much!!!!

You and some other guys work so hard for us, bringing so much info, pictures, great videos etc...

You are the backbone of all this forum that brings all Kimi fans together...Thanks again...

I agree this

Same here too, do appreciate all the efforts that are made to keep us uptodate with what is going on around Kimi whether it is about his work or whatever really enjoy it.

Also it was great to read these latest comments about Kimi, so refreshing as against all the anti comments he received in F1 no wonder he is happier in the Rally World

[momo]

Thanks Wolfie!

[Moominpappa]

RÄIKKÖNEN: 5th POSITIONS AREN'T ENOUGH

24.04.2010 14:14

From an interview with the French Autohebdo-magazine:

- I know who big my difference to the top drivers still is. I know that at times I can make comparable times with them but I should be able to do it more often. I develop all the time but 5th position with six minutes to the lead is not what I want, Räikkönen admitted.

- I was already ahead of Federico Villagra and Matthew Wilson on a regular basis. It doesn't give me reason to be enormously happy but it's reason enough to be satisfied, Räikkönen said.

- Jordan was a terrible experience. There were corners you had to drive in blind. I felt lost. I wanted definitely to finish the rally and that's why I didn't have any other option than to drive slowly, Räikkönen told.

MTV3 - Lauri Ouvinen

It seems that Kimi is taking rally driving really seriously I know - this is not a new news but seems that Formulas are going more far away fo past. I think that maybe I can hope more success to Kimi in Rally than I am thought he could get.

[Wolfie]

Oi, thanks everybody but I could say the same to all of you too

There was one surprising article in VM:

KIMI INTERESTS

We asked on the internet who is the most interesting Finnish motorsportsman at the moment.

Kimi Räikkönen grabbed the victory and 29% of VM-readers is following his rally business.

Mikko Hirvonen's ride with WRC-Ford has taken him to WRC-victories but in this poll Hirvonen took silver with 26% of the votes.

Mika Kallio's opening race in MotoGP went to the bushes but readers are interested in Kallio: 14% of the readers said Kallio was the most interesting Finnish motorsport-person at the moment.

Juho Hänninen in Rally IRC also got a good amount of votes, 8%, but Lotus F1-driver Heikki Kovalainen didn't get one single vote which was the super-surprise of this poll.

Poor Heikki

Kimi Räikkönen 29 %

Mikko Hirvonen 26 %

Mika Kallio 13 %

Heikki Kovalainen 0 %