Raikkonen: I didn’t miss F1 at all last year

Kimi Raikkonen in his Citroën

Kimi Raikkonen said in 2010 he conducted an interesting experiment to see if he would miss Formula 1 and it turns out that the Finn did not miss it at all as his stint in the World Rally Championship (WRC) made him a stronger driver.

Quoted by Autosport Raikkonen said, “I didn’t miss Formula 1 at all this season. Before the start of this year I thought it would be interesting to see if I missed it at all, and in fact I didn’t."

The 2007 F1 World champion says of his rally season away from Grand Prix racing, “For sure I have improved as a driver this season. Rallying is a lot harder than F1, certainly for me. If you can drive on some of the roads we did this year, you can drive anywhere."

Raikkonen, who drove for Sauber, McLaren and Ferrari during his career, was rumored to be considering a return to F1 with Renault. “Of course I thought about it, because you think about everything. But I never really thought seriously about it," he said.

Raikkonen did not take the rally world by storm and ended 10th in the championship. Nevertheless he was upbeat about the achievement, “On balance, this year has been pretty much as I expected."

He added, “There have been good bits and bad bits, and on the whole it’s been really tough with a lot of learning. In some ways it reminds me of the very first years when I was starting out in racing: it was a little bit the same feeling."

Meanwhile sources close to Raikkonen and his management indicate that he is most likely to sign with the Red Bull backed Citroen rally team after weeks of speculation that he would be defecting to Ford with Monster energy drink backing.