Kimi sent this second update at the end of Saturday’s competition.
Blog two: Saturday 13 November, 2100hrs.
“Well, here we are. I never thought that I would be so pleased to see Cardiff again. But there are two reasons to be happy. Firstly, it’s stopped raining. Secondly, we’ve had a really good day.
The first day of the rally on Friday was a little bit of a shock, because while I expected it to be difficult, I didn’t expect it to be that difficult. I thought that it might be because of the rain but today was a lot drier and it was still slippery. So it must be just how these roads are.
I think the biggest difficulty is that the amount of grip that there is doesn’t really match up to the amount of grip that you think there is. So you might see a corner that you think looks OK, but in actual fact it’s like driving on a road made of banana skins. On the other hand, you might then see a corner that looks like a skating rink, but then when you get there the grip is actually OK.
So how do you tell the difference? If I knew that, I suppose I would be leading the rally...
But for me it was always going to be a question of learning step by step. We started the day 10th and ended it eighth, which is always good. Sure, some of that is because Ogier went off. But the fact is that he made a mistake and we didn’t, which shows that we are learning.
It wasn’t a completely perfect day. We had a broken front-left spring in the morning, which cost us a bit of time, and then in the evening our light pod wasn’t perfectly adjusted. But these were just small things, and in rallying you have to learn how to drive around problems. So that’s what we tried to do.
We can’t take anything for granted tomorrow, as we’ve still got the Resolfen stage to drive twice, which is sure to be very tricky. I’m discovering new things all the time, and I know that I’ve said this before, but Rally GB is definitely one of the most complicated rallies that I have faced all year.
I’d really like to finish my first season in a positive way, so tomorrow we’re determined to get to the end and score some points. If we can do that, it will be mission accomplished.”
Source: WRC - Pirelli
