Kimi Raikkonen The Flying Finn

[Ashfaq]

Räikkönen had a long line of success in karting from the age of ten. His first race outside his home country was in Monaco when he was 15 years old. His steering wheel broke during the race and he informed his mechanic about the problem by waving the steering wheel in the air on the home straight. Räikkönen's next Monaco race was also memorable as he was thrown on the wrong side of the safety fence in a first lap collision, but continued driving there until running out of road and lifting his kart back on the race track. His mechanic thought Räikkönen had retired, but he eventually caught up with the other competitors and finished third. In 1999, Räikkönen placed second in the European Formula Super A championship. He also competed that year in the Formula Ford Euro Cup, and by the age of twenty, he had won the British Formula Renault Winter series, winning the first four races of the year. In 2000, he won seven of ten events in the Formula Renault UK Championship. After racing in the Formula Renault series later in 2000, Räikkönen had won 13 of 23 events — a 56% win rate.On the basis of these results, Peter Sauber gave the Finn a test with the Sauber Formula One team in September of 2000. After further tests in Jerez and Barcelona, Sauber signed Räikkönen for the 2001 season. However, some critics (including FIA president Max Mosley) voiced concerns over granting an F1 superlicence to such an inexperienced driver, having only 23 car races to his credit. He was nevertheless granted one and scored a championship point in the 2001 Australian Grand Prix, his maiden Grand Prix. Räikkönen was asleep 20 minutes before his first F1 GP. (It is said that he loves to sleep - so much so that he needs to be woken up before qualifying and races.)

Räikkönen is very calm, cool, and calculating in his race strategy - prompting the nickname "Iceman", which is subtly written on the side of his current helmet design. His other nicknames include Kimppa, Räikkä and Kimster (used by his mechanics). Some Finns jokingly call him "Räkä", meaning snot in Finnish. This nickname was derived from "Häkä" (carbon monoxide in Finnish), the nickname of Mika Häkkinen

He is the first driver to win on his Ferrari debut since Nigel Mansell at the 1989 Brazilian Grand Prix and the first to win, set the fastest lap and Pole Position on his Ferrari debut since Juan Manuel Fangio.

Räikkönen holds the joint record of 7 wins in a single season without winning the World Title (2005), shared with four time World Champion Alain Prost, who initially set the record in 1984 and matched it in 1988, and also with Michael Schumacher, in 2006.

In the 2005 season, he also equalled Michael Schumacher's record of 10 fastest race laps in a season, set in 2004.

He currently holds the fifth highest record for total fastest laps at 25 (jointly with Mika Häkkinen), thus making him the highest ranked driver still active. (Up to and including the 2007 Brazilian Grand Prix)