Räikkönen’s time at the Lotus F1 Team – née Renault, and now Alpine – in 2012-13 is best remembered by his coolness and meme-quality quotes.
In 2012, he had a much better season for Lotus than he’d had at Ferrari in 2009, finishing the season in 3rd position, with 6 podium finishes and 1 win at the Abu Dhabi GP.
The 2012 Abu Dhabi race was filled with so many of his classic quotes. “Just leave me alone; I know what I’m doing” is a prime example, and came as his engineer kept updating him on the time difference to a charging Fernando Alonso.
Later in the same race, in the lead and behind the Safety Car, his engineer reminded him to keep working heat into all four tyres, spurring Kimi to say the following: “Yes, yes, yes, yes, I’m doing all the time, you don’t have to remind every 10 seconds.”
Räikkönen was interviewed on the podium by David Coulthard, and it was there that he let slip another load of meme-worthy quotes:
In the rain at the Brazilian GP, Räikkönen slid off the track at the final turn and somehow got lost, as he had one of the most bizarre off-track excursions ever in F1, trying to find a way back onto the circuit. Classic Kimi:
KPH car blog 