Sore Kimi Raikkonen rues ‘messy’ start

Kimi Raikkonen (pic) said he felt both sore and disappointed after the early collision that eliminated him from Sunday's Turkish Grand Prix.

The Finn, driving for the McLaren Mercedes-Benz team, won the inaugural race at the Istanbul Speed Park in 2005 and had high hopes of doing well again.

But this time he was involved in a six-car shunt at turn one on the opening lap after Italian Giancarlo Fisichella spun in his Renault and was left facing the oncoming cars.

Raikkonen, hit by American Scott Speed in a Toro Rosso, crawled back to the pits with a shredded left rear tyre.

Then, when he returned to the track, he slewed off the circuit and into the barriers.

“It got very messy at the start,” said Raikkonen.

“I tried to avoid a spinning Fisichella, but then Speed hit my left rear tyre causing a puncture. I drove for almost a whole lap with a damaged tyre in order to get back to the pits to see what could be done.

“The team changed my tyre, but I think the car must have incurred quite a lot of damage at this point.

“When I re-joined the race, I came into turn four, had no rear end grip, got sideways, ran out of road, hit the tyre wall and that was it.

“My back is a bit sore but nothing to worry about. I'm obviously disappointed that my race was over so quickly, but there was nothing we could do.”

His McLaren team-mate Spaniard Pedro de la Rosa completed another solid race to finish in fifth position, having started from 11th.

“A good result coming from 11th position,” said de la Rosa. “There was mayhem at the first corner following Fisichella's spin and I just made it through despite lots of debris on the track.

“It was a tough race with the one-stop strategy as I had to look after my rear tyres and this made it challenging to be consistently quick.

“However my race pace was good and I could even overtake a couple of cars. With a higher grid position a better outcome to the race would have been possible.” – AFP