Despite finishing tenth in the second free practice session at the Circuit of the Americas on Friday, Kimi Raikkonen feels that it was not as bad a day as results seemed.
The Scuderia Ferrari driver had finished the opening session fourth fastest but struggled with the set-up of his car, but made a mistake on his qualifying simulation that meant he did not set a representative time in the second session.
As a result, Raikkonen feels there is not as much to worry about overnight, and although there is still work to be done to improve, they are not that far away from the pace as it seems.
“It was a tricky day: in the first session, we struggled to find the right set up, and in the second practice I went off with new tyres and couldn’t set a lap time,” said Raikkonen. “Apart from that it was a normal Friday, it looks worse than it is.
“We did a normal set up work and sometimes it goes like this. We did not have any major issue, we just tried to make a sense out of it and get the car exactly where we wanted.
“Now we have some work to do on the set up and make it correct for tomorrow. The Mercedes look very strong as they have been all year, but we’ll do our best.”
