Kimi unhappy despite third-place finish
Kimi Raikkonen believes he could have done better than Sunday's third-placed finish at the Spanish Grand Prix.
Lotus F1
Kimi Raikkonen: "I had a very good start and had a chance to overtake on the outside, but we did not have enough speed and I hit the limiter in fifth gear. I am a bit disappointed because if everything had gone right in the first part of the race, we could have won.
"There was no issue with the speed of the car, but it is so close between all the teams that if you have a small problem or a small issue it can cost so much. Our car can do it, but everything has to fall into the right place to be able to get on to the top step.
"My first stint was okay, but I didn't have the speed to stay with the cars in front. We changed the tyres and it seemed to be pretty good, but we were too far away. At the end we needed a few more laps and we could have fought for the win. We're not far away from it and so far we've made good steps forwards; the car feels strong everywhere."
Romain Grosjean: "We lost position at the start and with it a bit of front wing too! It was cooler today [Sunday] which didn't suit us so much. Despite this, I am very happy with P4 especially when you look at yesterday [Saturday] where I missed all of the final practice session.
"Both cars finishing strongly in the points is great for the team. It was pretty difficult for me at the start of the race as it was hard to get the front working properly with the wing damaged, but we made some changes and at the end of the race the car was really flying. I think we made the right decisions today [Sunday]; if you told us we could finish third and fourth at the beginning of the weekend we'd have taken it."
Mercedes
Nico Rosberg: "That was a difficult day for us and a very strange race. We didn't manage to find the right tyre management so I lost two positions towards the end of the race on my last stint which was 26 very long laps. The one positive thing is that I was able to defend my position against Lewis and keep seventh place, rather than eighth.
"Once again today [Sunday] we saw a surprising and well deserved win which is good for Formula One. Congratulations to Pastor and Frank at my old team Williams! Now I'm looking forward to my home race in Monaco in two weeks with some updates on the car."
Michael Schumacher: "Obviously I am not happy with the outcome of the race as I think we could have achieved some nice points today [Sunday]. But then this is sometimes what you have to go through in racing. It is not easy to see from the TV replays but what happened from my viewpoint was that he went to the right to defend the inside line, and then suddenly, shortly before the braking point, went to the left.
"When you are so tight together in the braking zone, you have no other choice than to try to react and avoid hitting but it was too late. It is a shame, as I said, but then what I will do now is to look ahead to the next race and try to attack there."
Sauber
Kamui Kobayashi: "The team did a really great job, and the update on our car works very well. The pace in the race was a big improvement compared to the last race. I absolutely believe I could have made it onto the podium today [Sunday] if I had not been so unlucky in qualifying yesterday [Saturday].
"If you start ninth you can be happy finishing fifth, but the car had more potential. I was in traffic and overtaking was not easy. I could not do it on the straights with the help of the DRS because there I wasn't close enough. So I had to take some risks and do it in the corners. I damaged my tyres quite a lot in the last stint.
"The competition is really tight at the moment. If you want to get in front of the pack you have to get everything right on the weekend. This is what Pastor (Maldonado) did. The last time I came fifth was last year in Monaco, and I am very much looking forward to returning to the Principality soon."
Sergio Perez: "We have been very unlucky at the start. In turn one I managed to get passed Romain (Grosjean), but then he hit me and I had to pit after lap one. We could not really recover from the back of the field, and later I had to retire because of a transmission problem.
"Whatever it was, it is over and I will be focusing on the next race. Monaco is a very special Grand Prix for me."
