Raikkonen: We did our best

Editor

Ferrari may still be a bit behind Mercedes in terms of qualifying, but Kimi Raikkonen was happy to produce the maximum in Abu Dhabi on Saturday.

Many expected Ferrari to be closer to the pace-setters at the Yas Marina Circuit this weekend, but Mercedes drivers once again locked out the front row of the grid with Nico Rosberg beating Lewis Hamilton to pole.

With Sebastian Vettel crashing out in Q1 after the team got their calculations wrong, it was left to Raikkonen to carry the flag for Ferrari and he delivered in Q3.

After being upstaged by Sergio Perez and Force India in the first two sessions, Raikkonen made his final lap count to beat the Mexican to P3.

"No secrets [to his good final lap]. The car's been handling pretty well all weekend and the laps haven't been ideal many times," he said. 

"Even the first run, it was an okay lap. I knew there was a lot of room to improve so I just tried to do one better lap and it was enough. We are still away from what these guys [Mercedes] can do, but we did our best."