Raikkonen: ‘Nothing positive’ about his Belgian GP

Jamie Woodhouse
Sauber Alfa Romeo Ferrari

Sauber, whose F1 team is currently branded as Alfa Romeo, are poised to extend their partnership with Ferrari until 2025.

Alfa Romeo’s Kimi Raikkonen said there was “nothing positive” to take from the Belgian GP since he didn’t score any points.

2020 has been a difficult season for Raikkonen so far and the Finn remains without a point to show for it after a P12 finish in the Belgian Grand Prix.

Some drivers would have taken comfort from the fact that they finished ahead of both Ferraris, but it’s well known by now that Raikkonen isn’t that kind of guy.

In fact, he said that there is “nothing positive” to take from a race if he doesn’t score points, whether than be a P11 finish or P20.

Asked by reporters after the race if he could take any positives away from Spa, Raikkonen said: “No not really, if we don’t get points there’s nothing positive about it.

“P11 or last it unfortunately makes no difference.

“It was a bad start, I went into anti-stall for some reason and after that we had quite a good speed at the beginning of the race.

“But just not enough speed to be higher up.”

Get your hands on the official Alfa Romeo 2020 collection via the Formula 1 shop

It was a far more eventful afternoon for his team-mate Antonio Giovinazzi who thankfully walked away unhurt from his second big crash at Spa in two years.

Giovinazzi lost control of his Alfa Romeo as he accelerated out of the Fagnes chicane before crashing heavily into the wall.

But the impact caused the left rear wheel to detach from the Alfa, at which point it travelled back across the track and hit George Russell’s Williams FW43, wrecking the front-right area of his car and sending Russell into the wall hard at the other side of the track.

Explaining the cause of the incident, Giovinazzi said: “I just had overtseer on the exit, I was pushing too much just to stay behind Sebastian [Vettel] in the DRS.

“Just too much on the limit, and when you’re always on the limit something will happen.”

Russell praised the halo device around his cockpit after admitting he was “scared” to see Giovinazzi’s rogue tyre hurtling towards him.

“If I went to the right, that’s where Antonio’s car was, and at the left side of the track, I had a massive impact with the tyre,” Russell said after the incident.

“But I have to say you feel much safer in the car now with the halo. When I saw this massive tyre coming towards me, it was quite scary, to be honest.

“So I’m very thankful that we have this halo on the car right now. I’m all fine. Just a little bit frustrated obviously. But that’s racing sometimes.”

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