Raikkonen Refutes Critics, Says He\'s Ready To Run

The Iceman is back in the game.Kimi Raikkonen returns to Formula 1 with the desire to race against other teams and drivers again, something he really didn\'t experience in his rally career. The 2007 F1 champion said he\'s coming back to the sport he deserted because he wants to do racing.\"I had a really good time in NASCAR racing against other people and I realized that I was missing this. That\'s when I decided if there was a good chance to return properly that I would do it,\" he said.However, Raikkonen remains interested in rallying and may even return to the sport one day. \"I still want to do rallying and if I could I\'d do them both at the same time--but this isn\'t possible. For sure I will do rallying again in the future,\" he predicted. As for F1, one might ask what motivates someone to engage in this type of competition, but the Finn knows. \"If I did\'t feel I had the motivation I would stop. My feeling is that I probably drove some of my best races in my last season in Formula 1 and I was very happy with my performance. I\'ve never had any issues with motivation,\" Raikkonen explained. Raikkonen, who worked with KERS in the past will have his first experience with DRS this year in F1. As he expressed, \"DRS is just a button. Once you\'ve done it a few times it will become automatic,\" he believes.His fitness is as good as it\'s ever been, he also said. While the G forces in an F1 car are very different from what he experienced in rallying the last few years. \"You get pretty good G forces in some tarmac rallies. The steering is probably a bit heavier in rallying too. You sit in a different position and you use different muscles. Rallying overall is probably not as physically tough in short bursts as Formula 1 but it\'s pretty mentally tough as you spend the whole week for about 12 hours a day in a car driving. In this way rallying is much more tiring than Formula 1. The driving itself is more physical in Formula 1, but I\'m looking forward to getting more sleep,\" Raikkonen admitted.As for his hopes this year, Raikkonen predicted, \"In my last year at Ferrari we weren\'t always at the front, but I\'m a good racer and I want to get to the front. Lotus started well last year and we hope that the new car will be strong.\"