Kimi Raikkonen says he is surprised by Ferrari’s pace at Suzuka after qualifying third for Sunday’s Japanese GP and putting himself in a position to take advantage for any problems for Mercedes.
His teammate Sebastian Vettel was fourth fastest, but falls to seventh due to a grid penalty.
Raikkonen had no explanation as to why Ferrari has jumped ahead of Red Bull since the last race in Malaysia.
“Honestly, it’s pretty much the same car that we raced a week ago,” said the Finn. “I don’t think many people have had a lot of difference. I’m positively surprised how well the car’s been behaving, and how quick it’s been. Obviously it’s been a bit tricky to get the right balance but it’s been pretty good and so far so good but obviously third is not exactly what we’re looking for but I think we’re pretty close. It was not too bad.
“We been suffering a bit of understeer all weekend and even in qualifying just slowing us down a little bit in the first sector but it got a bit better in the end. Obviously it got faster then but it’s the very small details that have to come together and we managed to put all these together more or less and the car’s been behaving quite good. It’s shame that Seb has a penalty but we will try to do the same if not better tomorrow.”
