Kimi's columns

[Ice-Ludy]

Thanks Ludy

The Finnish is also in so I'll start translating it.

thanks Ludy and Nikki

You're welcome Nikki and Kriss!!

[Wolfie]

Kimi Rally France preview in Finnish

Vive la France!

We have been waiting for this race in a positive way with Kaitsu ever since the speed was nicely found in the beginning of summer in rally Bulgaria.

The season's second new tarmac rally is in France and we get a bit of leverage because the others don't have notes from the last ten years and knowledge of familiar roads. We are all on the same line there.

There was no testing after Japan but we took the rally Vosgien in France as training and to get the feeling. It went well. We got some feeling to the car and feeling to the roads, which are similar to those we are now going to drive.

We were satisfied with Kaitsu with the work we got done in that short rally. First we took it the wrong way in setups but when we went back to the basic things we found really good setups for our car.

It's always difficult to say beforehand how the race will go. Only after we get to the area and start driving hoping that we find the rhythm immediately and get a hang of it without any difficulties in the beginning.

We would have to get to the finish line without bigger blunders but you never know because unfortunately I have rallied less than these other have and it's only through experience that I can do a good result all the time.

This is a special weekend for our Citroen-team. When you drive a French car in France you get a lot of support and fans.

The French people are rally-people just like the Finns are.

Sebastien Loeb has a chance to secure his umpteenth championship and it's sure that he will do his everything so that he can win and take the title at the same time in his home rally.

We go there to do our best. We have made totally simple blunders in the last two rallies. On tarmac my feeling is immediately better because it is afterall a more familiar surface to me. At least the training rally in Italy before Bulgaria helped so hopefully the same strategy hits home there too and we get a good rhythm on France's roads.

So it's Vive la France!

[momo]

Thank you Wolfie!!!!

[Acropolis]

Thank you Wolfie!!!!

Me too...

[Anelise]

Thanks Nicole!!!!

[tigerlily]

Many thanks! Wolfie

[SpaMaster]

It's interesting to note that Kimi has been saying he found good set-ups in the past few rallies. Remember in the first part of the season he said that he just had to drive and he could not point out if the lack of pace was due to set-ups since he is so inexperienced. He seems to have found options in set-ups now. That means he has definitely improved.

[Moominpappa]

It's interesting to note that Kimi has been saying he found good set-ups in the past few rallies. Remember in the first part of the season he said that he just had to drive and he could not point out if the lack of pace was due to set-ups since he is so inexperienced. He seems to have found options in set-ups now. That means he has definitely improved.

You are right. This promises good for second rally year

[Wolfie]

Wow, there is no Kimi Column on his site this time, Kaitsu has taken care of it

Kaj Lindström Rally France review in Finnish

From the co-driver's angle:

A FRENCH VISIT

Okay, I admit that my own expectations were high before Rally France. Kimi doesn't talk much about them beforehand but we had the feeling that it could go pretty cool.

It was a new place and new tarmac rally for everyone but the weather made it into something completely different than we expected. The cutting places only got worse and worse all the time and in the final games you would probably had gone faster with gravel tyres because you couldn't even see the tarmac under the s*hit.

The whole nature of the rally changed. The circumstances were difficult because of a) humidity and b) the steep downhills. It became worse and worse all the time. It was difficult for everyone. When comparing our times to Hirvonen's Mikko you could see that it was as difficult for him as it was for Kimi.

In the beginning we had problems with the center-locking. We lost the pressure and it worked like this and that. Sometimes it locked the front tyres, sometimes it locked the back tyres. It had to be taken apart which meant that you had to change the whole transmission.

On Saturday we got that unnecessary extra program. We just slided off the road in walking speed and the car got stuck from the stomach on the ditch with mud in a quite steep place. We got dudes to help us but not enough so that we could have pushed the car back on the road. We thought about it for a moment if we shuld push it down the hill but the risks of the car rolling over at once were too big.

We burned more time when I tried to ask with my poor French if anyone has a rope. Up to this day I don't know what rope is in French but finally we got one so we could pull the car back to the road with the whole gang.

We continued driving and even though the motivation wasn't the same as it was when driving for points we at least collected some more experience from these difficult conditions.

Then the second time came and the car fell so deep that we couldn't get it up from there anymore.

When there was only one decent stage on Sunday and the circulation in the city, Kimi decided that we would put our stuff in our bags, go home and save the car for Rally Catalunya.

It was the right decision because Sunday wouldn't have served tarmac driving in any way. We already knew that the only decent stage was dirty after making notes for it.

Sebastien Loeb got one more championship. He drives on his own level. We chatted with Loeb on Saturday in the hotel before we left home. After the rally we of course sent him a SMS congratulating him for the victory and the championship. It came quite easily because Sebastien Ogier fell behind the lead at such an early stage.

Now we look forward to Catalunya. There we will have two nice days on tarmac. The first day is 70% gravel, 30% tarmac when one of the three stages is completely gravel and the other two gravel/tarmac.

It was a wise thing to leave the last day and save the car and the engine that we will continue with in Catalunya.

[Claudie_Schnaudie]

They should take a dictionary with them So next time it´s the spanish one

thanks wolfie

yep strange that Kimi didn´t write one on his own first he doesn´t continue the rally then he is too lazy to write his own column! who knows what´s going on in his life

[Lynx'niK]

yep strange that Kimi didn´t write one on his own first he doesn´t continue the rally then he is too lazy to write his own column! who knows what´s going on in his life

17 Millions elimination
ciao Ferrari =)

[Wolfie]

This is getting weirder and weirder

[sleenster]

Well to be honest, if I went off the road twice in one day I couldn't be arsed to write a detailed description of it either

[Wolfie]

Well to be honest, if I went off the road twice in one day I couldn't be arsed to write a detailed description of it either

Are you telling me that Kimster is losing his motivation

[sleenster]

Well to be honest, if I went off the road twice in one day I couldn't be arsed to write a detailed description of it either

Are you telling me that Kimster is losing his motivation

Not motivation for driving, but motivation for talking about it!