Kimi Raikkonen
celebrates his 28th birthday in Sao Paulo with the decisive
race for the drivers' championship in sight. "I have no
special plans to celebrate: It is better just to focus on
the race weekend. I just hope for one present for my
birthday and I hope to receive it after the race on Sunday
afternoon!" said Kimi. "After the race in China I've been to
Dubai for a couple of days. They have great weather this
time of the year. We go to Brazil in position three. So I'm
not really the favourite for the title. But as we saw at
Shanghai two weeks ago anything can happen. Whatever will
happen, it's going to be a very exciting race. We will give
it all. It is nice to get on going after the Chinese Grand
Prix, where I had a very good feeling with the car and the
team. We couldn't do very much to prepare ourselves for
Interlagos. We have just done some simulations and analyzed
the data. Let's hope that everything will be all right for
this demanding and bumpy track. I know that the track has
been redone, but we have to wait and see."
"I think that our competitors have done their job as we did.
There's lots of pressure on both sides. They have two
drivers in the race for the title and they also fight each
other. Hopefully we can benefit from that," said the Finnish
driver. "At Interlagos we need a strong package, especially
the engine is very important for the long rising main
straight."
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"I'm not the favourite for the title but as we
saw at Shanghai two weeks ago anything can happen,"
says Kimi Raikkonen (above on the grid in Shanghai),
"whatever will happen, it's going to be a very
exciting race; we will give it all." |
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Kimi Raikkonen (above during the Chinese Grand Prix)
celebrates his 28th birthday in Sao Paulo with the
decisive race for the drivers' championship in
sight. |
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"I will start
into this race the same way as into the last two. My aim is
to win and the rest is not up to me. It is a similar
situation as in 2003, when I lost the title to Michael. But
at a certain point during the Japanese GP it was a really
close call. Hamilton has seven points more than us: there's
not much to calculate. We have to win and that's it."
Kimi also underlined that he doesn't expect the tyres to be
a problem: "I've been reading stories that the supersoft
tyres should be better for our competitors. That might have
been true early in the season. But then things improved for
us in terms of the setup. So we just have to wait and see
how it goes in Brazil. I have been close to winning at
Interlagos, but it has never quite paid off. I've finished
three times second, which is not that bad at all. Once I
already had the trophy back home for a couple of days. But I
had to give it back later because the FIA had checked the
classification again." "Two weeks ago I said the same about
Shanghai and then, this year, I won: let's hope history
repeats itself!"
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