F1
Nate Saunders, General Editor, F1 8y

Kimi Raikkonen: Ferrari struggling over one lap

Kimi Raikkonen admits Ferrari is struggling to warm its tyres over one lap in Azerbaijan after finishing Friday practice a long way off the pace of Mercedes.

Ferrari was expected to be Mercedes' closest challenger at this weekend's Grand Prix of Europe but Sebastian Vettel finished FP2 1.996s behind Lewis Hamilton, with Raikkonen a further half second behind. Some of that gap is likely down to fuel loads but Raikkonen admitted the team has not maximised its one-lap pace yet.

"We struggled to make the tyre work for one lap and they don't work exactly like we want," Raikkonen said. "The single lap time is not there but as we do more laps it seems to get better and better.

"We don't know what the others are doing, but when everything worked the balance was kind of OK. But it was more about trying to get the tyres to work for one lap and this seems to be a difficulty right now, more laps seem to help but over one lap it's we need to find something to get the grip out of them."

The Finnish driver admits grip issues are always bound to occur during a race at a brand new circuit.

"We have to see what we did today and see what we can improve tomorrow on that side. The circuit was OK, it is a bit slippery like all the new circuits but the layout is pretty OK. It's a different and new place.

Raikkonen stopped late in the session with what appeared to be an MGU-K issue but did not know any details immediately after the session.

"I don't know, I just walked back from there and I don't think the team know yet. The car just stopped but I don't know the reason."

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