Kimi's future - No racing in 2010?

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Originally Posted by SGWilko

With Raikkonen out the way, who is going to crash into Sutil now?

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not only sutil :rotflmao:

a pity if great driver like kimi has no ride next year, aren't there any new teams' seat empty, it is still good than remains without job...

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Originally Posted by leopard

a pity if great driver like kimi has no ride next year, aren't there any new teams' seat empty, it is still good than remains without job...

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Is it really? After winning teams such as Mclaren and Ferrari to go and drive around in the middle of the pack? I don't think so. I think that kind of steps down are for drivers who don't realize to quit (no names mentioned).

After things didn't work out with McHamilton, Kimi had two bad choices to choose from and I think he chose the right one.

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Originally Posted by Julle69

My opinion is that rallying is only a nice hobby for Kimi. Despite he was setting promising stage times in Neste Rally there is really long way to be in TOP. And if Kimi is seriously driving only winning is target and he can't get it in WRC in short time. He should make 3-5 years commitment to rallying to see if he is capable to be a winning driver also in rally world. I don't think he will do that. I heard from the media that Kimi is planning to do few rallies and maybe Le Mans next year. Let's hope he will make a come back for 2011. But still McLaren or Mercedes hasn't announced all their drivers!

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You are right about rallying. but Le Mans is a good choice, IMO he will be very competitive there.

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Originally Posted by F1boat

To all the Finns, how serious is Kimi about the WRC?

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He is very good - but so are the other drivers.
I think Kimi needs a year or so..then we can se..I hope he gets a car and take this year to practise Rally on the top level .. get a feeling for it..
But the guy is very good for all motorsport with speed ..a natural talent … especially asphalt rallies would be interesting..

It’s unpleasant that banks can pay out one of the best drivers on the greed..

Who is preparing Solberg's cars next year?
He needs funding to run? Even Gronholm wants to race in Petters team?
Any potential for Kimi with them? Rather than in S2k?

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Originally Posted by DexDexter

Anyway, I'm not interested in rallying at all, couldn't care less, sorry rally fans.

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Wow, are you a real Finn?! :p

Kimi only wants a championship winning car and according to his manager, is "too good for anything else".

...Here's a fact: Kimi had a title-winning car last year and got soundly beaten by his own team-mate.

I don't see why any team would pay good money for a driver who will only give 100% on a string of conditions.

He is quickly turning into the new JV.

Hmm... To make a small summary, I have to mention that I never really managed to particularly warm towards Kimi, with his personality being too cold to my liking. I know stories about him being "different" behind the scenes and cameras, but in public he really left an impression of a man with a mask, without giving much of a guess what kind of a (mysterious) person he really is. If I had met him, he may well leave a completely another impression, but at the moment it's all a bit "meh". But to take a view from a positive angle - he is in a way different to others, and there are barely any, who can really be compared to him in terms of personality.

Career? The McLaren days were really very impressive, but the whole Ferrari stint put him into a slightly different light, giving a view of him from another angle, maybe exposing his weaknesses more clearly than they were visible in McLaren. But if there is any driver in F1, who I have felt is slightly overrated, I have to concede it's got to be Kimi. But still - he is fast, very fast, one of the fastest. When I'm thinking about his most impressive drive thus far, Monaco 2005 is the first one that springs to my mind.

I have to say that I like Kimi's ambition that Kulta wrote about in his article - to become the first man to win both F1 and WRC titles. It's nice to see people setting themselves quite extraordinary goals and I hope he is going to pursue his dream of achieving something completely new and unprecedented in the history of motorsports. Now that would be a truly historic achievement.

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Originally Posted by Josti

Wow, are you a real Finn?! :p

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Typical misconception, rallying is not as popular in Finland as F1. It was very popular back in the 80's with Markku Alen etc. but the popularity has declined a lot.


So in 2010 Kimi will do nothing (or a couple of rallies) while Ferrari pay him more than any current F1 driver. That still sounds incredibly stupid.

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Originally Posted by DexDexter

You do know that he is actually one of the most popular current F1 drivers? Outside his native country as well. It's a sad day for F1 that a driver like Kimi is not there in 2010. Yes the guy is different, shy, introvert (even for a Finn) but the reason I like him so much is that he does what he wants and cannot be controlled by any corporate types or anybody else. That's rare in F1 these days, most of the drivers are puppets of the teams.

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I agree with you, there is no doubt he is popular for his definite speed and different personality, and although I don't really like him, I clearly give him credit for that. From a team and sponsor's point of view, however, he remains an expensive and difficult to work with driver, which pretty much explains why he didn't get a seat (and why Ferrari wanted to get rid of him, despite him being the better driver than Massa).

The whole "McLaren or nothing" attitude itself further illustrates that. If he doesn't have enough motivation to race in F1, which other drivers would KILL for, then maybe he shouldn't...