Vettel signs up familiar F1 physio

Kimi Raikkonen’s long time fitness coach and physiotherapist has started work with another Formula 1 champion.

For almost 20 years, the British physio worked hand-in-hand with 2007 world champion Raikkonen at McLaren, Ferrari and beyond - having worked previously with another Finnish champion, Mika Hakkinen.

Now, with 42-year-old Raikkonen finally retiring, 49-year-old Arnall is moving to another part of the F1 paddock yet again - Aston Martin.

He will work with quadruple world champion Sebastian Vettel, who is known to have been close with his former Ferrari teammate Raikkonen.

Arnall, whose duties kicked off in Barcelona this week, will share the 23-race workload in 2022 with German Vettel’s existing trainer Antti Kontsas.

"I’ve known Seb for many years, and we were all teammates for four years at Ferrari," said Arnall on Wednesday.

"There was always both a mutual respect and a great friendship between us all. I’m really happy to now be working together."

As for Vettel, he got down to work in his green 2022 car on Wednesday and observed: "In slow corners, the car behaves very sluggishly - like a truck.

"That is due to the high weight, but in high-speed corners it is very fast - really fun to drive."

As for the new 18-inch tyres, he commented: "We already knew that they would not overheat as quickly as the old ones.

"But when you drive fast, you lose traction even faster than last year. Apparently it’s because the design has to be more rigid."