Lewis Hamilton eyes strong result

Lewis Hamilton is relishing being amongst friends this weekend as he escapes the animosity that followed his on-and-off-track Monaco madness

Hamilton was forced to make a handful of apologies in the wake of his contentious sixth-placed finish in the principality 10 days ago.

Initially Hamilton "made peace" with the four-man panel of stewards after suggesting, via an apparent joke that badly backfired, that his skin colour lay at the heart of their decision making.

The 26-year-old vented his frustration against the stewards after being penalised three times over the course of the weekend, and five times in six races this year.

Hamilton was given drive-through penalties - one retrospectively - for causing a collision with first Felipe Massa in his Ferrari and then Williams' Pastor Maldonado, the latter at a time when he was on course to score his first points for the team.

The McLaren star described the Brazilian and Venezuelan as "ridiculous" during his post-race outburst, later apologising to both men via his Twitter account on which he had also been abused in the aftermath of what unfolded.

Hamilton has already made it clear a victory in one of his favourite races, the Canadian Grand Prix this weekend, will help put the stigma of what happened in and after Monte Carlo behind him.

Aiming for a third win in five races at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, Hamilton said: "Montreal is a very special place for me.

"It's where I took my first Formula One pole position and won my first race. I also won there last year from pole.

"I've always got on really well with the track as the layout seems to suit my driving style.

"Perhaps even more importantly the fans in Montreal, and everyone in North America who makes the trip to the city, are some of the best in the world.

"They are so positive, supportive and friendly. My trips to the city have been some of my favourite experiences in Formula One.

"I'm massively looking forward to arriving in Montreal to a friendly welcome."

With Hamilton currently 58 points adrift of reigning Champion and current leader Sebastian Vettel, he knows a third Canadian win is a must this weekend.

"Our car should be well suited to this track," said Hamilton, who led a McLaren one-two with Jenson Button a year ago.

"We have a great engine, the best KERS (power boost) system in the sport and excellent traction out of slow corners.

"All in all it's set to be another good weekend for us. I'll be looking for a strong result on Sunday."

Source: Planet-F1

Hamilton: Not a disappointing result

Despite losing the Spanish GP by less than seven tenths of a second, Lewis Hamilton insists he's not disappointed

With everyone expecting the Red Bull duo of Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber to romp away to a 1-2 in Spain, the race was turned on its head when Fernando Alonso took the lead.

But it was all change after the second round of pit stops when Vettel and Hamilton emerged in first and second places.

And although the McLaren driver did his utmost to take the lead away from the reigning World Champ, it was not to be.

"I don't think we can be disappointed with today," said Hamilton, who had only words of praise for his McLaren team.

"The team did a fantastic job throughout the pit stops and throughout the weekend, they put us in a fighting position.

"We got the best start and were able to keep up with the Red Bulls and Mark (Webber) in particular as Fernando (Alonso) was holding the Red Bulls up.

"As the race went on we had some serious pace but it was very tough to get past Seb at the end, they were massively quick in high speed corners and in the last corner his downforce was incredibly clear.

"Nonetheless I gave my all and to move forward and score some good points and retain second place is great."

The latter stage of the grand prix saw an intense fight between Vettel and Hamilton with the McLaren driver dogging the German lap after lap.

However, the Brit concedes that even though McLaren have improved their car, the Red Bull is still the quicker of the two.

"We did a great job considering their car is a good step faster than ours," he said.

"Our race pace has improved since last race, that was the positive.

"I wasn't able to follow through high speed Turn 3, obviously Turn 9 and the last corner, I was never able to get close enough to maintain the gap and then able to use the DRS.

"But I am very happy with the job both me and Jenson did and to be able to apply pressure to Red Bull considering the circumstances is good."

Source: Planet-F1

Kimi's Column: SECOND TIME'S THE CHARM

Kimi Rally de Portugal preview in Finnish

I was left with good feelings from Rally Sweden. It went better the second time than it went last year. It will be interesting now to see how it goes for us this weekend.

In Portugal, now that we are driving there for the second time also.

I remember the roads from last year. It's really a very challenging place. You have to drive precisely according to the note with your tongue right in the middle of your mouth because you have stones and stumps ahead of you and behind you. What is new is that the rally starts from Lissabon and there is also a completely new stage on the route.

This is our first rally on gravel with this car. I like the car. It's sort of more handy and it fits better in my hand.
As a gravel rally Portugal is one of the most trickiest when your have to twist and turn all the time. I think that only Jordan is a wee bit more worse than Portugal beause the roads in Jordan are so slippery all way long.

Last week we had one testing day in France. I got a good feeling of it. We fixed the setups a bit and got a good feeling of the car. In that sense it's cool to go to a race again.

The others got a bit of leverage because we didn't go to Mexico. They have now more experience of these new cars. Of course Portugal is a completely different place than Mexico. We are on Europe's side and the air isn't as thin as it is there in the mountains. We get to use all the powers and it's always cool to get everything out of a car.

The goals are the same as they were in Sweden: We try to drive as fast as we can and avoid bigger blunders. It went well in the first rally and if it goes well again then we should get a good result.

The learning continues. We have to drive precisely during the weekend and get the notes to hit in place.

Lets wait and see how it goes this time.

Source: KIMIRAIKKONEN.COM
Courtesy: Nicole

Schumi: Reasonably happy with Spa result

Michael Schumacher says 'seven' seems to be his number at Spa as he achieved a P7 on his debut in 1991 and a P7 on his return on Sunday

The Spa-Francorchamps circuit has many fond memories for Schumacher, starting with the very beginning on his Formula One career in 1991 when he shocked the world by qualifying in seventh place in his debut grand prix with Jordan.

Now, almost two decades later, it was another P7 for Schumacher in Belgium, although this time in a race, as the German came from 21st place on the grid to finish in the points on Sunday afternoon.

"I am reasonably happy with today's race, especially for the team," said the seven-time World Champion.

"Coming where Nico (Rosberg) and I started, I think we can all be pleased with the result, sixth and seventh places from 14th and 21st on the grid is not too bad, and it is important points for the Constructors' Championship.

"For some reason, the number seven is somehow connected with me in Spa, so there is a further special feeling here."

But, he concedes that "without the weather being even crazier, we could not have achieved more today in my view."

However, Schumacher's first race at Spa since coming back from retirement wasn't without incident, although most of those were between himself and his team-mate Rosberg.

"I 'met' Nico twice out on the track today," he said. "The first time, I had the better go in a nice racing duel and the second time was right after the re-start where I had to lift a little up into Eau Rouge due to the car in front which Nico used to fly past me.

"All in all, Spa turned out to be nearly as enjoyable as I had hoped for."

Source: Planet-F1

SPEED YES, RESULT NO

Kimi Bulgaria Rally review in Finnish

We are collecting experience here. We got a nice amount of it from Bulgaria's rally. Speed-wise it was already okay even though we didn't get anything result-wise.

It was a new place for everybody. The stages were great and it's a great rally as long as they put things in the organisator-department in condition. Now they even let the ambulance come to the stage when we were in the ditch.

I was left with a good mood. More good than bad. If I could have kept the car on the road on Friday during the last stage, Citroen would have got first five positions in the endresults for sure. Our pace would have been enough for the 5th position.

We started very well. I feel the grip on tarmac better and we can go faster. You could see it from the speed how the difference to the leading guys stayed small. All the work that we have been doing during the beginning of the season is starting to pay itself back. I still have a lot to learn but at least we saw that we were going in the right direction.

The roll bugs me. It wasn't any dramatical thing. I just waited a little too long before hitting the brakes. There was loose sand on that spot. Had it been clean we could have got it turned back on the road. Instead we went from a slow speed on the roof.

I didn't have the greatest feelings on Saturday morning. When we were those ten minutes behind, we were so far away that I didn't exactly have any other job than to take the remaining two days as testing.

Then it just started to go again. We saw that we got closer to the last points. On Sunday we got the car even better which will help in the following rallies on tarmac.

We did our everything to catch up with Henning Solberg but since he didn't make any mistake we just couldn't get close enough. If we would have drove that one cancelled stage, then we might have been able to get up in the group of ten.

I learned a lot again. Next we go to Jyskälä. We have a couple days of testing before it and we already have notes from last year. It's the highlight of the season and the feelings just get better and better now that we know the place from before.

It's a completely different thing to drive there with a WRC than with a S2000 but the stages are the same again. If we can make it without mistakes, then it's good.

Source: KIMIRAIKKONEN.COM
Courtesy: Nicole

Driving with Kimi – Kaj Lindström; Bad result but a lot of good

11th place was not what we went to Bulgaria for. But there were a lot of positives in this weekend's rally: the speed is there, it's just a shame that a small mistake, which had big consequences on the rally's opening day Friday, ruined the good result. Kimi just braked a little bit too late into one tightening right corner. He did try everything in that situation. When he realised that the car was not turning he tried to turn it with the handbrake but nothing could be done.

The race ended there from the 4th position. We were able to continue on the next two days thanks to the Super Rally rule and a 10 min time penalty but the chances for a good result were gone.

For us the main thing this season is not the result but the learning process. In Bulgaria we learned again a lot about the notes and our pace was good throughout the weekend. After six WRC rallies we were already able to drive pretty close to the top. When with our amount of experience we were only 2 s behind on a 30 km special stage with our amount of experience, that was not very much, not much at all. And we were after all the fastest Finnish pair of the race on several special stages.

Bad result but a lot of good. I have to be very pleased.

It was a good thing that the mechanics managed to get the car into shape and we could continue the rally since especially on Sunday we found new set-ups that suited Kimi really well. It was clearly noticeable that the driving got even better. After the last two special stages we agreed that this alone was worth continuing since we really did find such new things for the set-up that will surely help us on the dirty asphalt roads of Germany.

Before that we drive in Finland. It is a bit weird that during the next month I won't have to drive to the airport once. And our team mate changes for Rally Finland. Sebastian Ogier will rise to the main team and Dani Sordo, who's a familiar team mate for us from Arctic Lapland Rally and a nice dude, will drive alongside us. For Rally Finland we will drive som tests and we go there in good spirits. Some of the stages we know from last year. It's always nice to drive in Finland.

Have a nice rest of the summer everyone and we'll see each other on the last weekend of July in Jyväskylä!

Source: Kolmeks.fi
Courtesy: Dracaena