I try to win the race - Raikkonen

A combination of factors in the FIA press conference: the fact that most of the media interest is focussed on the fight between the two McLaren men and the fact that Felipe Massa is a local boy meant that there were not many questions for Kimi Raikkonen this afternoon, which is actually the way the laconic Finn likes it!

"Yesterday (Wednesday) was Raikkonen's birthday, his twenty eighth, but with a big weekend coming up, he told the media he had not bothered too much about it. "When you get older, it's not the same any more. When you're young you're more excited but it was a normal day really." At this point, his team-mate Felipe Massa pointed out that "he is very old!" Asked if he might delay birthday festivities until Sunday, the Finn replied: "I think we will celebrate something else. I never really remember when happened last time, usually we're too busy."

On to more serious matters, the Ferrari man maintained he would try and tackle this race in exactly the same way as any other. "I think you are always a little bit nervous every race, but I try to do the same as in any other race, I try to do the best I can, I try to win the race," he said. "As a team we will try and finish one and two and then it's not really up to us any more, so that's really all we can do and hopefully we can achieve that. As for this track, it's a nice circuit, it's quite challenging. I have quite a difficult race history here over the years. I enjoy it now, but it's going to be a little different with the new surface and nobody knows how good it will be so we will see tomorrow, but it's always nice to come back to this circuit."