F1 Champion Kimi Raikkonen coming to NASCAR
 

Looks like another open wheel racer is going to try and compete against the world's greatest drivers in the NASCAR series :winkwink:

http://jayski.com/cupnews.htm#20110331f


" Former Formula One champion Kimi Raikkonen has received approval from NASCAR to compete in the Camping World truck Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway on May 20th. Raikkonen is slated to make his debut in the truck series later this summer with a team that includes former Richard Petty Motorsports principal Foster Gillette as a partner....... According to a newspaper in his native Finland, Raikkonen will drive some time this summer in NASCAR's Truck Series and eventually move to Nationwide and Sprint Cup. "

prepare yourseleves for a character!!
This guy cares about nothing but racing and getting on with the job in hand!
Wish he would come back to f1!

There was a time when NASCAR turned their back on " outsiders " but over time they have come to learn the positive aspects those " outsiders " bring to their series and now welcome them with open arms. NASCAR is more than willing to help them out to get a good start in the series.

One of the biggest assets is the fact that Kimi will bring a fan base with him and that will create a new audience that will increase the NASCAR fan base. When Danica came over to NASCAR she brought a lot of fans with her. When Juan Pablo came to NASCAR he brought a lot of fans with him and it's all positive for NASCAR.

All those fans will now take the time to follow their favorite drivers and in doing so will gain an understanding of NASCAR and in turn begin to appreciate it. It's a win win for everybody. I'm not familiar with Kimi but I do hope he has something to add and makes the racing even more competitive and entertaining. :thumbsup

It's driving round in circles isn't it? I think her should manage that.

Every track in the world in every kind of racing except drag racing is a glorified circle.

Can't WAIT to hear Kimi on his in car radio transmissions.
LOL!
Even during pre or post race cleanly miked interviews, you could barely understand the guy!

Good driver, though! :p
:thumbsup:thumbsup

wow very cool!!!!

No Kimi thread is complete without:





:1orglaugh

Infact i'll add this in there too:


Oopssssssss !!!! :1orglaugh

haha this'll be good :)

That is so weird, I used to say the exact same thing... and I would add "I can make left hand turns... Pay me a million a year!"

But since I started watching NASCAR because my oldest son is rabid for it, I have learned a lot and it is pretty damned exciting. The idea that one car passing another at those high speeds can cause them to spin out without ever touching them.... it can get very intense.

I know NASCAR is not for everybody, especially if you don't know much about the sport beyond the driving in circles thing, but I look forward to every Sunday (and on certain tracks I watch all three series).

Go Tony!!
14

Yeah i'm not a NASCAR fan either, but i do get that there's much more to it than just how it looks on tv.

My problem is usually keeping track of what's going on most the time. F1 in that respect is much more straightforward...

:thumbsup

I think it would change a lot of peoples minds if they were open minded to learning more about what is really going on. The more you know the better it gets. If you have the chance to actually go to a race and experience it that way it helps a lot too. Standing near the fence when about 40 cars go by side by side, nose to tail at almost 200 mph will make you a believer.


:1orglaugh at the two Kimi videos above. That won't fly in NASCAR so he's either going to have to adapt or go back to Rally

you mean a washed up f1 driver is going to compete against drivers who weren't good enough for a f1 testing job?

I was trolling a bit with that statement but honestly, I don't know why so many open wheel racers have come over to try NASCAR while no original NASCAR driver has expressed any interest in open wheel. My guess is it has more to do with how the series operate than the ability it takes to race.

Love this...

i think one of the problems is that F1 driver are very close to the evolution process of their cars - which are very complex compared to nascar. they must be able to analyze how the car behaves on straights and corners and tell their engineers what to change. as a nascar driver you get no chance to learn that on the same level - how can someone with no experience for example on a track like Monte Carlo give valuable information to his team?

i am not saying they cant learn that and be successful, but it would take a while. and probably longer than most team owners would give them.

another example: DTM is very popular in Germany http://www.dtm.com/index.php?lang=en&

there's a couple of ex F1 drivers who were later driving there - including Alain Prost, Mika Hakkinen and David Coulthard. None of them ever won shit there. Because it's a completely different way of racing.

last years DTM champion Paul di Resta is now driving F1 - we'll see how good he's doing the other way round.

i hope kimi does well, i probably wont be following it on TV, but he's a straight talker, if he isn't enjoying it he will let you all know!

Not to mention the right turns!

Certainly the F1 cars are far more complex than Stock Cars and NASCAR purposely tries to keep the teams costs down by limiting the cars complexity. They've even gone as far as to ban testing on tracks they race on to save teams money.

You say that F1 drivers tell their engineers what to change on the car for performance. NASCAR drivers will describe to their crew chief how the car is handling and based on the description the crew chief will make the necessary changes. There's a difference there.

While Danica knows how to drive a race car, one of the things she had to learn was how to speak in NASCAR terms and relay the cars performance to her crew chief so he could figure out what changes to make. She has to become a living onboard computer and relay data to her crew chief. It's one of the obstacle open wheel drivers first face when coming to NASCAR. Terms like understeer and oversteer in F! become lose and tight in NASCAR. Both describe the same thing.

NASCAR drivers are very talented and I think over time one or two could compete in F1 but you made a great point and it's probably the reason they don't make the switch. No F1 team would be willing to train one from scratch and there is far too much money involved to give one a chance. On the flip side an open wheel racer can come into NASCAR and get a ride in a car for just a few thousand dollars. That makes sense to me :)