Planet-F1

Kimi: I knew Ferrari had the pace

Monday 24th March 2008

Kimi Raikkonen was always confident Ferrari would come out on top against McLaren at the Malaysian GP - in which the Finn got his title challenge back on track with a comfortable victory.

Raikkonen crossed the line 18.5 seconds ahead of Robert Kubica's BMW after 56 laps of racing in Sepang, with Heikki Kovalainen's McLaren a distant third some 38 seconds back.

Lewis Hamilton finished fifth to see his lead at the top of the drivers' standings cut to three points, after his season-opening triumph in Australia last weekend.

The two McLarens were hampered from the outset by a five-place grid penalty picked up on Saturday for impeding Nick Heidfeld and Fernando Alonso. But the Ferraris had proved much the stronger in any case, outpacing their rivals for most of free practice and qualifying.

Raikkonen, who finished eighth in Melbourne after his engine failed in the latter stages of that race, was not the least bit surprised that a McLaren threat failed to materialise.

"No, I think it's been the same all weekend," he said.

"I already said in Australia that our speed should be fine. When you start behind someone, as in Australia, you can never use your own speed.

"Australia is not exactly a normal circuit, so sometimes you get slightly wrong results there.

"Last year we were much faster than everybody there, and coming here we were not - so it's a the opposite now.

"I think the next race can be different again, so we need to wait and see - and after a few races we will get a clearer picture where we are exactly."

Raikkonen hit the front when he came out ahead of team-mate and pole position man Felipe Massa after the first round of pit stops.

The Brazilian subsequently span out of the race, allowing the 28-year-old to cruise to the chequered flag.

"Once he pulled in, my car just got so much quicker - and I was able to go more than half-a-second faster on my in-lap," he added.

"It was enough. We knew that it was going to be close, and it worked out perfectly.

"Once I was in front of him, the car was much better in the second stint - and I was able to pull away."

Raikkonen trailed Massa by nearly half-a-second in qualifying - but the Finn was never worried his team-mate would have the edge in the race.

"Felipe has been fast. But like I said from last year, qualifying has not really been the strongest point," he said.

"Again we had a good Q2; then the tyres didn't work as well in the final qualifying.

"That was a bit disappointing, but we knew that the car would be strong in the race and we would stop one lap later.

"We put a lot of effort on that, and it worked out well."