Raikkonen: So far it’s a good feeling

Although Kimi Raikkonen reckons Ferrari’s pre-season has been “much smoother going” than in recent years, he concedes that may not mean much come the end of 2017.

The Finn topped the timesheets at the Circuit de Catalunya on Tuesday and Thursday splitting the honours over the four days with reigning champions Mercedes.

Overall it was Mercedes who were quickest thanks to Valtteri Bottas’s 1:19.705, however, Ferrari weren’t far off with Sebastian Vettel two-tenths shy.

Ferrari tallied up 501 laps, second busiest team after Mercedes who managed 525 laps.

It was, according to Raikkonen, a good start for the Scuderia but one that may not necessarily yield the rewards that they want.

“It feels a lot better, but that’s what you expect with the rule changes,” Raikkonen said.

“We’re going to be optimistic every year, but where we’ll be at the end of the year is hard to say.

“We’ve learned our lesson from the past years and the team has made a good jump over the winter, but is that going to be good enough? We will see during the year.

“But so far it’s a good feeling. We can’t complain too much. I think it went pretty OK, considering what we had planned.

“You always wish to do more here and there, but this is what we did in four days and if we compare it to one year ago, I think it’s been much smoother going, so it’s a good start.”