Kimi Raikkonen: “What happened on the first lap ruined my race. First I was hit at the first corner, then when trying to pass Webber, I was hit and lost the front wing. At the pit stop, I ended up with some drops of petrol in my eye, from the fuel line stuck on Kovalainen’s car and then I was engulfed in flames and blinded: I was going to stop, but luckily the flames soon went out. Even now, my eyes are still burning, but I’m alright. After the restart, I could only try and use the strategy to move up the order and at least I brought home a few points. I am disappointed because today I’m sure we could have made it to the podium. There is one race to go: let’s see what we can do in Abu Dhabi to get back that third place.”

Boy that must have hurt.

Yeah, Heikki was literally warming him up for McLaren next year!!!

Warm welcome indeed!!!!

A bit surprised that he could actually drive on if he did burn his eyes that bad. But he would of course just have put some ice cream on his face to cool it down.

visor?

I know they're professional drivers and paid a hefty wedge to do something millions would love to do, but I'm not quite sure I would be able to keep my composure if I were faced with a similar scenario!

Kimi's accident reminded me of Vitor Meira's at Indy this year.

Vitor got a bigger round of applause, I think.

Ever got an eyeful of petrol vapour? It hurts.

That was seriously unlucky for Kimi.

And a great pity we missed out on the race he would have had.

That incident could have been a lot worse.
Anyone care to imagine a burning Ferrari driving into another team's pit-crew, complete with fuel-rig...

drivers often crack their visors open in the pitlane, presumably for some ventilation. Kimi may have had his visor open a bit.

I hope his eyes and vision will be OK.

It's all very interesting, but reading the press statements reveals that, had there been no accidents or incidents, 18 drivers would have been on the podium.

What a chicken.


He drinked stronger stuff than F1 petrol.

lol so what are you saying, he should have asked for seconds?

that was my thought....if he had not hit the brakes he could have hit the pit crew that was already in the lane (was that the brawn team? ) and even at the limited spped and all the gear, people still could have been seriously hurt. Very bad scene that most have no idea as to how close a diasisater we came.

i tend to agree, a heart stopping moment

The helmets also have ventilation that would have accepted the petrol vapours...and vapour can easily be enough to mess up your eyes. Driving with a completely sealed helmet would be mighty uncomfortable.

Well, what the hell, it was a cheap way for Kimi to get a tan, he kinda needed it

Scary moment there, I hope his eyes will be okay.



An eye-tan?

Indeed, not quite as heart stopping as Alonso's wheel flying off just a day after the Massa incident, but it could have been nasty.

Kimi is not lucky this year, first there was his KERS trying to poison him to death, and now someone else's fuel..

The should have done the old Le-Mans style starts.

Very lucky for Kimi, but boy does that guy have balls - nothing seems to faze him! Just like when he flew into Panis' engine smoke at Spa that year at full speed.

Yeah, but quite obviously Kimi is the first one on that list.

It must not be comfortable in the flames, but Kimi soon kept going. I'm sure someone like Jacques Villeneuve would have jumped 2m high out of the cockpit.

Yeah too right, I remember that well, one seriously cool customer !

Villeneuve? bizarre choice for a low blow on that topic..

I'm sorry, but there are many things you can take the rise out of JV for.

Lack of courage is not one of them. Witness his Spa crashes.

Im still thinking how did McLaren and/or Kova got away with this? Luckily F1 does a great job in anti-fire security, as with everything security-related.

EDIT: I see now they fined the team and gave a penalty to Kova. Still it should have happened during the race, don't know what they were waiting for...

I think you don't remember the case, when his Honda engine blew and the car caught fire wile he was parking. He jumped out of the car over the fence like a rabbit! It was a funny sight

"I was not scared because I could not do anything anyway. I saw that Kovalainen lost fuel, but I did not know where to go to avoid. Unfortunately, it flowed all over me, I even got some fuel in the eyes. Suddenly flames were on my helmet and in the cockpit, but I was lucky. If there would have been more fuel that went up in flames, then I had to stop." -Kimi Raikkonen

Kimi is crazy.

he was also lucky that all the vodka is his blood didnt caught fire.

How does the 'today's F1 drivers are pussies' crew look now?

Wow. Was it this year that Kimi's cockpit suddenly started to fill with thick smoke in the middle of practice that was pouring out the sides of the cockpit. He just kept driving calmly round the track, completely surrounded by the smoke that kept pouring out his cockpit. And brought the car calmly to the pitbox. That takes some balls.

Managed to find a picture:

^looks like an entity in the cockpit...

I don't know how Brazilian civil law works, but he may just have a good lawsuit threat to drag out to McLaren if they don't meet his financial/extracurricular demands in his contract negotiations.

Then again, the whole episode had a hint of McLaren telling him "That'll teach you to demand too much money and too few days with sponsors!" ;)

LOL I remember that but that he was most definately not calm then. He almost jumped out of the car while it was still moving.

i remember that,he was leaning out to get some air ,v calm

"I saw Heikki's car with the hose still attached. I got sprayed by fuel on the helmet and in my eyes, as my visor was open as it always is in the pitlane. I shut it as fast as I could and I almost had to stop to ensure that everything was OK. I lost some time but at least I was OK." (Kimi in Turusanomat)

On another note of the incident, it was also good to see that the Brawn mechanics were good sport helping out Heikki to remove the fuel hose in no time.

Well I suppose it's a bit late now as refueling is not in F1 next year, but it doesn't strike me as the smartest move to have your visor open while in the pit lane with refueling taking place. Unless he opened it a little as he drove out of his pit box.

They usually always open their visors in the pitlane to get some fresh air.

That's exactly what I thought,if he had his visor up in the pits to get some air.

Balls of platinum!

He was calm. The idea was to jump out in one single movement, in case it was a KERS issue. He didn't want to become the ground wire for the chassis.

This I would like to see!

"I wasn't afraid co's there's nothing i could do"? what the hell? That is the main reason that I get scared! LOL.that kismet's boy is just a litle crasy.

By the way, any link if that time his car had smoke all around and he was driving it?