Would The Real Kimi Raikkonen Please Stand Up?!

“Paging Kimi Raikkonen. Would the real Kimi Raikkonen please step forward and show your talent.”

Something along those lines must of been the call the Finn got as he boarded the plane home from North America. Since his return from a lacklustre pair of races – or to be more precise a lacklustre season so far, the Iceman seems to have finally found his feet in Ferrari.

At France and then in England we bore witness to the Kimi of old. The racer, the fighter, the Iceman. It begs to question where the real Kimi Raikkonen has been all season. After a dominant victory in the season opening Australian grand prix at Melbourne Kimi has been a ghost stuck in the shadows of Felipe Massa. Questions were rightly asked of his commitment and his drive, especially when he chose to storm out of the Ferrari garage when things went awry at Spain and then at Monaco. This was the man charged with replacing Michael Schumacher.

Now with the return to Europe we finally see the Kimi Raikkonen that drove balls to the walls in a McLaren for victory, even if it resulted in the car breaking down. This was the man that Ferrari coveted to replace Schumacher. This was what we expected from the Finn.

Why has it taken so long for him to become settled? I expected him to struggle at first to find his feet at Ferrari given that Massa was already snug in the team. But the depth of his struggles has been surprising. His rise in form coincides with the re-emergence of Kubica and Alonso to the performance levels expected. The paddock talk has been that the three of them have struggled to adapt to the new Bridgestone compound. After half a season they seem to have finally gotten to grips with how to use them allowing them to challenge their team-mates on a more consistent basis. Raikkonen more so still has a long way to go in adapting his style to turn his raw speed into consistent results. Looking at the reliability of the McLaren’s compared to the Ferrari this year against last year it would appear that Raikkonen’s ‘bad luck’ with reliability has carried over.

Perhaps it is more than ‘bad luck’. McLaren’s Martin Whitmarsh commented that he felt Raikkonen drove too aggressively which led to the high amount of reliability issues. His run of reliability woes in the Ferrari lends credence to these comments. Raikkonen will need to learn to adapt if he is finally unlock the potential we all know is there.