Formula One news

Todt praise for Raikkonen and Massa

Ferrari team boss Jean Todt has been full of praise for Kimi Raikkonen and Felipe Massa after they both drove very strong races at Silverstone on Sunday - Raikkonen taking the win and Massa carving his way from the back of the field to finish fifth. 

"I will say that Kimi sometime was very happy with the car," Todt said in response to questions over how long it has taken Raikkonen to get used to a new team. "I just think of the first race in Australia, where he was on pole, quickest lap during the race, won the race and he had some more difficult races. We knew that looking back at the races like Monte Carlo, Canada, Indianapolis, we were not at the level of our major competitor and in Magny Cours and here, mainly during the race, we were probably performing better than them. I don't have any idea what will be the situation for the coming races. That's why we need to push hard and try to improve as much as we can, on the car and definitely on the reliability, because we have had too many problems with the reliability since the beginning of the season."

That was partially a reference to Felipe Massa stalling on the grid. "When Felipe went to the grid, he informed us by radio that finishing the burn-out the engine stalled," explained Todt. "For the time being, we have not understood what was the reason so hopefully we will understand in the coming hours and we will be able to give you the information, but we don't know yet why it happened. Anyway, it's something that was wrong with the car, he didn't do anything which caused the problem."

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