Kimi Raikkonen has concurred with teammate Sebastian Vettel who stated that Mercedes was too far out of reach today. Raikkonen, who qualified third, was over a second behind Lewis Hamilton who claimed his second consecutive pole position.
The weekend has also seen many drivers struggling with tyres. In the practice sessions, drivers were continuously taking to escape roads and qualifying saw many laps being laid down on a set before a driver could unleash his ultimate pace. Raikkonen said that the tyres did not work as well as they did yesterday.
"The whole weekend has been about making the tyres work well and today we struggled a bit more than yesterday," said Raikkonen. "If you can get them working 100 per cent on one lap you can easily go a lot faster, but it was not the case today. When we were able to switch the tyres on, the car felt nice, but this feeling kept changing from lap to lap and from set to set.
"I did not feel comfortable going into the first corner and could not push so hard. It was easy to slide or make a small mistake. It was always on the edge of working and not working, but on the last lap it felt a bit better. Third place is obviously not a disaster, I take it happily.
"I think we did the best we could achieve today. In the race, with morelaps, the tyres should start working better. I’m positive that we are going to be a lot closer to our competitors."
Fergal Walsh
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Bahrain International Circuit - Winter testing
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