Kimi Raikkonen urged to shake up Saturday form

Raikkonen at Monaco — Photo: © LAT Images

Alfa Romeo

Raikkonen urged to shake up Saturday form

Raikkonen is one of five drivers yet to score a point this season

Sam Hall

Thursday 3 June 2021 10:59

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Alfa Romeo team principal Frédéric Vasseur has urged Kimi Raikkonen to improve his qualifying performances in a bid to boost his chances of scoring points.

Antonio Giovinazzi registered Alfa Romeo's first point this year by finishing 10th at the Monaco Grand Prix, although has trailed Raikkonen in three of the first five races.

The Italian, though, has out-qualified the Finn on four occasions, underlining to Vasseur the job Raikkonen is doing on a Sunday and the need to perform better on Saturdays.

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"At the end of the day we are scoring points on Sunday and Kimi is always doing good races on Sunday," Vasseur told the F1 Nation podcast.

"I hope he will be able to qualify in a better position because when you have to start from 15th, 16th, with no DNFs it is very difficult to score points. But we hope that Baku will be a different story.

“On some tracks where it is quite difficult to overtake or impossible to overtake, when you are starting from P16 it is just impossible to do it.

“For sure, with Kimi, we need to improve a little bit in quali and also to have two cars, we can play a game with strategy and so on but I think I am quite happy with the job done over the last couple of months."

Challenging Alpine and Aston Martin a "good step forward"

Despite scoring just one point so far this season, a total that matches Alfa Romeo's score from the same stage last year, Vasseur is convinced the team is heading in the right direction.

“Compared to last year we have made a good step forward and we closed the gap with the midfield," added Vasseur. “To have one car in Q3 was the target but it is the target on every single Saturday not one time per season and now we have to score points much more often and I think that we have also to appreciate the job done.”