Massa vs Raikkonen
After the retirement of Michael Schumacher, Kimi Raikkonen and Felipe Massa will be battling for the number 1 position in the team. So this season, there won't only be a battle between the different teams, but also within the teams, especially at Ferrari.
I won't be an easy season for Kimi Raikkonen. As the newbie in the red team, he'll have to battle with Felipe Massa, who already has narrow links with the team for many years. The Brazilian signed a long-term agreement with the Scuderia in 2001. In 2002, the team decided to let Felipe drive for the Sauber Team and only one year later he was assigned a role as test driver for Ferrari. In 2004 and 2005, Massa moved to Sauber again, but got the opportunity to test for Ferrari on several occasions. After the departure of Rubens Barrichello to the Honda Racing F1 Team, Ferrari immediately signed Felipe as their second race driver.
Still, this isn't the only reason why Felipe Massa has rooted well in the Italian top team. Nicolas Todt, son of team boss Jean Todt, is the manager of Felipe Massa. This obviously has influenced his relationship with Jean Todt as they are really close. Felipe also has an amazing link with Michael Schumacher, his teacher, who still holds an important role within the team.
The 2006 season didn't start as Massa expected. Although the little Brazilian showed his race pace, he made a mistake in Bahrain and crashed twice in Melbourne. Felipe Massa asked to swop race engineers as the collaboration with Rubens Barrichello's former engineer, Gabriele delli Colli, didn't work out for him. During the European Grand Prix, Rob Smedley became Massa's new race engineer and Felipe immediately scored his first podium finish at Nürburgring. Of course the most memorable moments for Massa this season were his first Grand Prix victory at Istanbul Park and of the victory in his home Grand Prix at Interlagos.
Kimi Raikkonen had less reason to celebrate in 2006 as McLaren couldn't score a single victory. The fast Finn was announced as the new Ferrari race driver at Monza, where Schumacher announced his retirement from motorsport. Due to his obligations towards McLaren, Raikkonen couldn't test for over 3 months, while his new team mate drove thousands of test kilometres.
Last week Raikkonen made his debut in Ferrari's 2006 challenger, the 248F1, at Vallelunga, and will test the F2007 for the first time today at Valencia.
It will be a very difficult year for Kimi Raikkonen as he still has to get the know the team, the car...and he'll get a lot of competition from team mate Felipe Massa.
