• German Grand Prix - Qualifying

Third on the grid was possible - Raikkonen

Kimi Raikkonen: "I think we had a chance to be third place" © Sutton Images

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• Race:
• German Grand Prix

• Drivers:
• Kimi Räikkönen

• Teams:
• Lotus F1

Kimi Raikkonen thinks his Lotus had the potential to qualify third for the German Grand Prix, but traffic on his outlap hindered his tyre warm up procedure.

Raikkonen will start fourth behind Lewis Hamilton on pole position and the two Red Bulls. He was just under 0.3s off Mark Webber in third and thinks that deficit could have been overcome if he had his front tyres at the right temperature when he started his flying lap.

"I think we had a chance to be third place but we had some traffic on the outlap with my new tyres and we didn't really get the fronts working as I wanted," he said. "We lost probably three tenths to our fastest time in the first sector so it would have been very close. But it's still much better than it has been [in qualifying recently]."

It was Raikkonen's best qualifying since the Spanish Grand Prix, where he also started fourth and went on to finish second, but he played down the significance for Sunday's race.

"It should be better than before at the last couple of races but it's not so easy just because you are closer to the front than before because there is still every chance something can go wrong," he added. "In the race we are often stronger and it looks like it will be hot so that should be better for us, but I cannot really say what we will do. Since the morning [practice session] we are much closer [to the front] so it's going the right way."

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