Formula One news
Kovalainen excited towards new season
09 March 2009Heikki Kovalainen starts his third season in Formula 1 this season, and is confident that the McLaren MP4-24 can be the car to propel him to great success. Last season saw Heikki take his first pole position at Silverstone, followed by a race win at the Hungaroring; this vital experience is what he hopes can allow him become Finland's leading driver in 2009.
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"As a Formula One driver you have to go into every season believing you can be world champion, otherwise there's no point being here," Heikki, 27, told the official F1 website. "I totally believe I can go into the new season with every chance of fighting for the world championship. I've learned so much from last year, I think I've developed as a person and driver and I know that if the car is good then I'll have every chance of fighting for wins. If that happens, I hope it will lead me towards fighting for the title."
Following a very unpredictable winter of new regulations and bad weather, Kovalainen is cautious and will be taking every race as it comes: "It's still too early to say how the car will behave when we are in Melbourne. Firstly, because we are still bringing new parts in for the car and have not yet run the car with all the components that you will see in Australia; there is no single area we are focussing on but we are bringing in new components all the time such as for KERS, tyres, aerodynamics and the engine. However, I seem to spend most of my time driving the new car in the wet so I can't give you a really accurate clue about how it will behave in the warmth of Australia!"
Heikki has spent most of the off-season in his homeland of Finland, where the fitness regime was key to his 2009 preparations: "I've really enjoyed training over the winter. I went back to Finland and did a lot of cross-country skiing to build up my core fitness levels. Since then, I've been working with my trainer to get ready for the new season. I feel fitter and better prepared now than I did a year ago, and am convinced that this will have a positive effect on the race results."
Mark Webber predicted today that Red Bull, Toyota, Williams, McLaren, Ferrari and Renault are the teams to beat at the moment; Heikki gave his opinion: "Honestly, who knows? Everybody at McLaren has been working so hard over the winter and we feel we have a strong package. But who knows how much everyone has really done over the winter? Not even testing can give you a proper indicator - that's what makes F1 so fascinating and unpredictable, and why I can't wait to get to Melbourne to find out!"
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