Raikkonen: Second was not good enough
By Jonathan Noble and Pablo ElizaldeSunday, September 7th 2008, 15:11 GMT
Kimi Raikkonen said he did not want second place at the Belgian Grand Prix after crashing out on the penaultimate lap while battling for the lead with Lewis Hamilton.
The Ferrari driver had led the majority of the race, but Hamilton benefited from the rain during the final laps to close the gap and pass the Finn.
Raikkonen regained his position when Hamilton and the Ferrari driver himself nearly crashed into the spun car of Nico Rosberg, but lost it again moments later when he spun too.
The world champion then lost control of his car again and crashed against the wall.
Raikkonen admitted it was all or nothing for him.
"I was prepared to win or lose, but unfortunately I went off," Raikkonen told reporters. "
I only wanted to win. I slid wide on the fast left hander, and tried to come back on the circuit but I spun.
"I needed to get points so wanted to win it or lose it but unfortunately went off. I didn't want to finish behind we would have lost points. We see what we can do."
Raikkonen made contact with Hamilton a few times while battling for position, and their clash was put under investigation by the stewards.
Hamilton jumped the final chicane when the pair made contact, and although he let Raikkonen past, the Briton kept his momentum and overtook him on the following corner.
Raikkonen did not want to comment on the incident.
"There are rules about cutting chicanes and gaining an advantage and they are looking it. So I don't have anything to say," the Finn said.
The result left Raikkonen a massive 23 points behind Hamilton in the standings with just five races left. Teammate Felipe Massa is eight behind the Briton, and it is now likely the Finn will have to play a support role.
He said, however, that he is only planning to win races.
"It is not up to me if he (Massa) wins or not," he said. "I will do the best I can do and we see what the situation is. I try to win races and we will see what happens."
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Kimi Raikkonen, Ferrari, (18th):
"I came here to win and I came close. In the final laps the track conditions were very critical and unfortunately, I ran wide and when I tried to get back on track, I spun and ended up in the wall. It was a shame because today the car was working really well. I got a good start and managed to pass Felipe on the straight and then overtook Hamilton when he spun at the start of the second lap. On the soft tyres, I could run at a good pace, while the final set, the harder ones, was not quite there - definitely not as good in performance terms as those I'd used in the past couple of days - and the balance of the car was not as good as earlier. The arrival of the rain definitely did not help. In these conditions, if you are in front you have to be more cautious as you don't know how much grip you'll find in each braking area. That's how Hamilton managed to close on me and then happened what you all saw. It's the second race in a row that I've failed to score points.
Clearly the championship situation is what it is, but I'm not the sort to give up that easily."
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Ferrari won't rush team orders decision
By Jonathan NobleSunday, September 7th 2008, 18:00 GMT
Ferrari have vowed not to rush into making a decision on whether to throw all their support behind Felipe Massa in the world championship fight from this weekend's Italian Grand Prix.
Massa's inherited victory in the Belgian Grand Prix, allied to Lewis Hamilton's demotion to third for cutting a chicane, has left the Brazilian just two points adrift of his McLaren rival in the title standings - but more importantly 17 ahead of Raikkonen.
And with Ferrari well aware that giving Raikkonen free reign to take points off Massa in the title chase could prove costly judging by how tight the fight is with McLaren, the Maranello-based team have admitted that if they believe the time is right to impose 'team orders' they will.
However, Ferrari team principal Stefano Domenicali has made it clear that no decision has been made yet about making Massa their number one – and the team felt under no pressure to do so just yet.
"We will take the decision in the team interests," he said at Spa-Francorchamps. "In my view, the situation that we have now is something that we need to think about with no rush because it's something that is part of our approach to the races.
"If we feel that it's the right time we are going to do it. But let's take this Sunday, with so many events that we take back home, (and) prepare for Monza in the right way. This is the main target that we need to be focused on in the next few days."
Although Ferrari's current straightline performance will make them well placed for a good showing at Monza next week, the difficulties the F2008 has in dealing with kerbs could prove a problem.
"Well, as we said, Monza for us is not really the ideal track also because we are expecting not really high temperatures," said Domenicali. "So the only thing we can do is really to try to work very, very hard, because we know that McLaren is very, very strong above all in Monza, but not only there as we can see.
"Yesterday we were very impressed by their performance in qualifying. To be honest, that shows how tense the championship is, how it will be close to the end. We know that they are very strong, and we cannot give up for a second.
"Today, there was another lesson. You really need to wait, we always said that but today was really clear: you have to wait not only to the end of the race but also afterwards.
"That shows that really the situation is very complicated. We will push and work hard because we respect and we know that our competitors are very, very strong."
