Raikkonen unconcerned about future as speculation mounts

Kimi Räikkonen says he is unconcerned by speculation that his drive at Ferrari is under threat saying that “there is always speculation” and that he will “know at some point what will happen”.

Ferrari have an option on the 35-year-old who is out of contract at the end of the year, but Raikkonen’s wavering qualifying form, with a highest start of third in Canada and a lowest of 14^th in Austria compared with two front-row starts and four third-place grid slots of team-mate Sebastian Vettel, has led to question marks about his future with the team.

Speculation surrounding his future has intensified in the wake of recent racing errors, such as the spin in Canada which cost him third place and the accident in Austria in which he lost control and collided with Fernando Alonso.

Valtteri Bottas has been heavily linked with Raikkonen’s place at Ferrari, while Le Mans winner Nico Hulkenberg, who has in the past been linked with a seat at Ferrari, has once again been associated with a move to Maranello.

Raikkonen, though, is philosophical about the speculation and about the recent suggestion by team boss Maurizio Arrivabene that the Finn’s future is in his own hands.

“We try to do good races. Obviously the last race was a bit difficult but that’s part of the game, sometimes you have that,” he said when asked if he was on course to meet the team’s targets for him. “Who knows: I don’t know anything more than you guys, so I will know hopefully at some point what will happen. There are always speculations to start off the year and it’s always the same stories. It doesn’t really surprise me a lot, so let’s see what happens.”

Regarding his Austrian Grand Prix crash and whether it affects his approach to this weekend’s race at Silverstone, where he had a major crash last year, Raikkonen said that such accidents are “part of the game”.

“It doesn’t matter if you have an accident. It was obviously bad for our race but that’s part of the game,” he said. “It doesn’t change this weekend at all. I’ve had accidents before and probably will in the future, you pay the price when things do wrong.

Meanwhile, Williams’ Felipe Massa, who was Raikkonen’s team-mate at Ferrari from 2007 to 2009, believes that Raikkonen is experiencing similar pressure to that which the Brazilian experienced at the Italian team and advised that the Finn “needs to relax”.

“Everybody says ‘Iceman’, I tell you he's not really like that," Massa told reporters this afternoon at Silverstone. “For sure he can suffer as well with the pressure and he shows that as well in some results.