Ferrari could not threaten the Mercedes in Shanghai

The most important moment of the race for Kimi Räikkönen was the start: starting sixth, he managed to overtake the two Williams cars at the first corner, which placed him right with his teammate: Given my position on the grid today, which wasn’t ideal, 4th is a good result. My start was good. I was able to get off the grid well. At the first corner, I decided to go inside and by the end of the corner, I was in the right place and managed to overtake the Williams on braking. My car is very good for that.

He then spent a long time in the wake of his teammate, without directly threatening him. He believes he could have attempted something at the very end of the race, but the safety car prevented him: « Towards the end of the race, I was making a comeback. I knew I had the speed and still good tires. I could have had a chance to try and fight for the podium, but the safety car came in and we can’t change that. Today, we were close to the podium. From the next race, we need to have a better weekend by achieving a good qualifying session and doing our best. »

As for Sebastian Vettel, he did not manage to repeat the feat of Malaysia but believes that the team has nevertheless come closer to its rivals: « In the end, we can be really happy. It’s only the third race and the progress we have made so far is very impressive. 3rd and 4th makes me very happy for the team. Obviously, I would have liked to put more pressure on the Mercedes: after the first two stops, we were just behind them but in the last stint, they managed to pull away quite easily. We are closer than we were four weeks ago, which is positive, but we still have a lot of work to do. »