WRC Rally of Spain: Kimi Räikkönen's Lucky Numbers

Today hasn’t been the luckiest day for The Iceman, who retired from the Rally of Spain on the opening morning of the event with engine problems. Still, at least it went better for him than it had done the previous year, when he crashed during the shakedown before the rally actually started

So in order to give the flying Finn a bit of encouragement, here are some lucky numbers that have influenced the illustrious career of Kimi Matias Räikkönen…

3...

The Citroen DS3 WRC is Kimi’s rally car, run by his own Ice 1 Racing team. This year is his second season in the World Rally Championship, and he says it’s been a lot easier than the first year. “It just feels a bit more natural,” he points out. “With the pace notes it’s starting to get to the point where you don’t have to think about it too much.”

5...

Kimi’s best result on the World Rally Championship has been fifth place, which he took last year on the Rally of Turkey. His best result so far this year has been sixth, in Jordan and Germany. However, he’s already scored more points so far this year than he did throughout the whole of the season last year. “Actually, Turkey was quite lucky; lots of people had problems,” says the Iceman.

6...

This was the competition number of the Ferrari F2007 with which Kimi clinched the 2007 Formula One title. He started the final grand prix, in Brazil, running third in the standings but came through to win the title: the first person to reverse his fortunes in such a way since Nino Farina in 1950. “It was a strange year for us,” recalls Kimi of his championship-winning season. “It started off badly and then got much better.”

18...

The number of grand prix wins claimed by Kimi, equalled by Red Bull’s double world champion Sebastian Vettel at the Italian Grand Prix. Vettel was asked what he thought about matching Kimi’s total and said that he was pleased, but added that he reckoned that Kimi had a few more grand prix wins left in him. Let’s wait and see…

582...

The amount of horsepower that one of Kimi’s favourite road cars has: the Mercedes Benz CLK Coupe 55 DTM. Only a hundred of these were built, as a tribute to the DTM Merc. It pulls 1.35G under acceleration and has a top speed of 322kph, thanks to a supercharged 5.4 V8 engine. From 0-100 kph takes 3.8 seconds, so hold on tight. Many people have been truly terrified by this car with Kimi at the wheel.

1990...

When Kimi was still driving for Ferrari, he first contested the Rally Finland in 2009. You have to go back to 1990 to find the last time that an active Formula 1 driver took part in a World Rally Championship event, when Derek Warwick – at the time a Lotus driver – took part in the RAC Rally at the wheel of a Subaru Legacy.

Source: Red Bull