2017 Singapore GP, Kimi Raikkonen: "A painful ending"

2017 Singapore GP, Kimi Raikkonen: “A painful ending”. Kimi had managed a perfect start to Sunday’s grand prix.

Scuderia Ferrari Finnish driver Kimi Raikkonen summed up his exit from the 2017 Singapore Grand Prix in typical Kimi style: “I got hit.” The Maranello team’s driver had managed to make a perfect start to Sunday’s grand prix, however, that put him firmly in the firing line as he swooped up the inside of Max Verstappen only for Sebastian Vettel to come across the track. The trio made contact which ultimately resulted in a triple retirement.

“I got hit.” – Kimi Raikkonen said, when asked to comment on the unfortunate incident whick makes things a lot more difficult for Ferrari in the championship fight with Mercedes – “I made a good start and I got hit and obviously there was nothing I could do after that. That was the end of the race so now we see what happens. I don’t know about Max, you have to ask him. It was one of those things and you pay a big price for it. But I don’t think I could have done anything different from what I did to avoid it. It’s a shame but that’s it. I had a good first 100 metres but then the race ended there. We are out and it is far from ideal.” – the Finnish driver explained, as reported by the Italian media.

As for who he believes to be responsible for the incident at the start, Kimi Raikkonen admits the fact that it is irrelevant, adding the only important part is that he – and his team-mate – were out of the 2017 Singapore Grand Prix: “Blame? The end result is the same whichever way you look at it. That’s really the only thing that matters now and whatever comes after that it still doesn’t make any difference. The fact is we cannot change it that we’re no longer in the race – that is really the bad part. The painful part for us is that both our cars were out of the race after the first few hundred metres – it’s far from what we would have hoped for. It was one of those things and it was obviously bad for our race. Far from ideal, but it is what it is. You probably saw it better than me, but we got hit and taken out; that was the end of our race. The are always different views from the people watching it, but I don’t know. All I know is that I couldn’t have done anything differently to avoid it.” – Kimi Raikkonen concluded.