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Raikkonen: There cannot be any reliability issues

Kimi Raikkonen is looking forward to the start of the 2021 season after a lot of downtime over the winter. He believes pre-season testing will be more important than ever this year.

Kimi Raikkonen has revealed he has taken it easy in the lead up to the start of the 2021 Formula 1 season. The former world champion is the most experienced F1 driver ever but is still motivated to race hard and compete against his midfield rivals. Alfa Romeo had a disappointing year, finishing eighth in the constructors' standings and Raikkonen was the team's number one driver despite turning 42-years-old this year. He's very relaxed going into the 2021 campaign. "I haven’t been doing much since the end of last season," said Raikkonen. "We had Christmas and New Year’s right after Abu Dhabi, so we went to Finland for a while before coming back to Switzerland. I’ve been spending time with the family, doing normal things, training and visiting the factory a few times. In general, very basic home things - soon we will start travelling again, so I made the most of the time off. "I don’t have a fixed schedule, there are no big plans made in advance. I enjoy training, but if one day I feel that I do not want to train, I will train the next day. It’s not the end of the world!" There will be just three days of pre-season testing this year on March 12-14 meaning each driver will get one and a half days of the car. Raikkonen's experience will be key so the team can get through their programme. "We will find out what the main priorities are soon enough: of course, the team always has many things they want to try," added Raikkonen. "The drivers may prefer to do one thing, like trying different set-ups, so you need to find a compromise so that you get the most out of these days. "There cannot be any reliability issues – you can’t afford to lose half a day or a full day as you will be left with not much to work with. It’ll be important to pick and choose the right things to tests, trying to spread it over the three days: I am hoping for good mileage and to finish the week feeling positive."

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