Today Kimi has said it is McLaren or nothing and he will walk away from F1.
(GMM) Kimi Raikkonen has confirmed he is in talks with McLaren about re-joining the British team.
"It wouldn't make sense to change to any other formula one team," said the Finn, who has agreed to leave Ferrari one year early to make way for Fernando Alonso.
"Nick's qualities are well known to us, but still nothing is decided," Mercedes competition boss Norbert Haug is quoted as saying.
Nick's best quality right now is his ability to be used as leverage to try and get Kimi's price down. Nick has never been a winner and will never be a winner. It would be a great move for him - he can finish his career playing Barrichello to Hamilton's Schumacher, and he can put another 10 million euros in his bank account on a two year contract. It would be great for Hamilton as well, not having to worry about a serious challenge to his supremacy on the team. But it would be a huge loser move for McLaren. If having a German is so all-important, Adrian Sutil is the only choice. He's been incredibly competitive with inferior equipment.
Williams confirms Barrichello and Hulkenberg The strong speculation surrounding the driver line up for the Williams Cosworth team in 2010 has now been confirmed with the announcement that Rubens Barrichello and Nico Hülkenberg will join the Grove based squad and work together next season.
"Rubens needs no introduction. He is not only the most experienced driver in Formula One, but a passionate and talented driver who fought hard for the drivers’ championship this year,” Sir Frank Williams said. "Nico Hülkenberg won the GP2 Championship this season as a rookie and has previously won the F3 Euroseries, Formula Masters, A1 GP and Formula BMW Germany.”
The two new drivers will not move to the team until the end of 2009 and until then, Nico Rosberg and Kazuki Nakajima will remain the team’s official drivers .
“ I would like to thank them for their contribution to the team," Williams added
Heidfeld now on pole for McLaren seat UPDATE #2 The ongoing discrepancy between Kimi Raikkonen’s wage demands and the salary that his most likely F1 2010 employer McLaren-Mercedes is willing to pay him could force the Woking-based outfit to look to out-of-work BMW-Sauber refugee Nick Heidfeld instead – as it emerged that the Finn might do better financially by taking a year off.
Following the official announcement that he was being released by Ferrari to make way for fellow F1 World Champion Fernando Alonso next season, Raikkonen was linked with a number of teams, from Renault to Red Bull and Toyota to McLaren.
However, whilst the 2007 title-winner wasted little time in making clear that only the latter option was of interest to him having competed for the Silver Arrows for five years from 2002 to 2006, triumphing nine times along the way and arguably being unlucky to miss out on title glory in 2003 and 2005 – it soon became apparent that there was, and remains, quite a gap between his own valuation of his financial worth and McLaren’s estimation.
Due to having been forced to terminate Raikkonen’s contract a year ahead of schedule, Ferrari promised to pay the 18-time grand prix-winner €17 million if he does not compete in F1 in 2010, or €10m if he does. To that end, Germany magazine Auto Motor und Sport reports that McLaren is offering a deal of just €5 million, reasoning that his total would thereby be a more than acceptable €15 million – but the 30-year-old’s management team of Steve and David Robertson is said to be unwilling to budge on its demands, as well as the stipulation that Raikkonen has to attend fewer sponsor days than would be the norm.
Should no agreement be forthcoming, it is being mused that of all the other names mooted as potential team-mates to 2008 F1 World Champion Lewis Hamilton – assuming, as is widely anticipated, that Heikki Kovalainen is not retained for a third consecutive season at the multiple title-winning concern – Heidfeld is near to the top of the list, with team principal Martin Whitmarsh having told spox.com that in his opinion the experienced German is perhaps the most underrated driver on the grid.
Heidfeld himself has admitted that he is ‘not ruling out any team’ in the wake of BMW’s withdrawal, and should ‘Quick Nick’ indeed join McLaren, it would doubtless please engine-partner Mercedes-Benz and represent a deserved boost for the oft-overlooked man from Mönchengladbach.
The 32-year-old acted as McLaren-Mercedes test driver back in 1998 and triumphed in the International F3000 Championship (now GP2 Series) for the McLaren Junior Team the following year, only to be passed over in favor of then Sauber team-mate Raikkonen when Mika Hakkinen retired at the end of 2001, to the general surprise of paddock observers. Whilst Raikkonen’s career subsequently took off, Heidfeld’s has yet to really accelerate out of neutral – but a McLaren seat in 2010 could finally offer him the chance to fulfill his undoubted talent and break his grand prix duck. YahooEurosport UK
It's interesting that it's not just the money, it's having to face those pesky, sniveling sponsors. Take the $17mm and you'll have no sponsor days to contend with, Kimi.
Button absent as Brawn celebrate in local town
(GMM) Ross Brawn has declined to confirm reports that his Brackley based team has finally agreed a deal with Jenson Button.
The claim by the Swiss newspaper Blick seems unlikely, given that the 2009 champion elect was conspicuously missing during a team parade through the streets of Brackley on Monday.
Members of the locally based F1 team, winners of the constructors' title, rode through the Northamptonshire town in open-top buses, while team heads Brawn and Nick Fry sat on the back shelf of a Mercedes convertible.
Asked about Button - who is currently holidaying with his girlfriend in Japan - and the fact he is yet to be confirmed as an ongoing driver for 2010, Brawn said: "I can give you 99 per cent on Jenson Button (staying)."
The parties were recently several million pounds sterling apart on the amount of Button's retainer for next season.
Brawn added: "We have nothing more to say at this time except that we expect to be in good shape for next year."
He also refused to be drawn on the likely deepening of Brawn GP's collaboration with Mercedes, with Germany's Auto Motor und Sport claiming an announcement is due within days.
"No," answered 54-year-old Brawn, when asked if he would like to comment. "It's too early to say anything."
Jenson Button is the luckiest man in motorsports and needs to accept that luck got him the title. Kimmi needs to take the pay cut and hope he gets a ride that will get him on the podium a few times next season. Sutil and Kobayashi will be great additions to any team next year and 2 drivers we should watch over the next few seasons.
Jenson Button is the luckiest man in motorsports and needs to accept that luck got him the title. Kimmi needs to take the pay cut and hope he gets a ride that will get him on the podium a few times next season. Sutil and Kobayashi will be great additions to any team next year and 2 drivers we should watch over the next few seasons.
I agree. Although, I'd say it wasn't 100% luck that got Jenson the championship. You don't come in ahead of Rubens if you have no talent.
And I'd love to see the Hamilton/Raikkonen combo at McLaren. With the 10mm pound subsidy from Ferrari, Kimi wouldn't be taking much of a cut.
Sutil and Kobayashi have definitely turned some heads. Kobayashi jumped in the car and really drove it. Good stuff!
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