Kimi Raikkonen is confident that Scuderia Ferrari is heading in the right direction following a number of changes within the team over the winter and the arrival of a new regime at Maranello.
After a disastrous 2014 campaign that yielded just two podium finishes and not a single race win, a revolution took place at Ferrari as Luca di Montezemolo, Stefano Domenicali, Marco Mattiacci and Fernando Alonso were all forced out of the team.
Now, Ferrari is under new mangement with Mauricio Arrivabene joining as team principal, whilst four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel has been drafted in from Red Bull.
Raikkonen endured a miserable first year back at Ferrari in 2014, finishing 12th in the final drivers’ standings, but he feels that the team learned a lot from its difficulties.
“I think we learned a lot from last year,” Raikkonen said. “Sometimes you have bad years and it goes like that, everything seems to be a bit difficult.
“I re-understood a lot of things and hopefully we can turn things around and as a team be strong and get where we should be, little by little getting stronger.
“The way the team works has changed slightly from last year, and I think it’s the right direction. We know we have quite a lot of work to do, but I enjoy being with the people and being in the team.”
Today saw Ferrari launch its new car for the 2015 season, the SF15-T, and Raikkonen hopes that it will be as quick as it is beautiful.
“It looks different than last year’s car,” Raikkonen said. “What I’ve seen from all the data, for me at least, it looks good.
“Usually when it looks good it should be a pretty good car, but obviously we have to wait until we get testing to see how it is. First impression is good.”
