Kimi’s exit caused by fuel leak

Citroen Racing Technologies’ boss Benoit Nogier has confirmed that a fuel leak caused Kimi Raikkonen’s retirement from RallyRACC-Rally de Espana on Friday morning.

Raikkonen, Formula One world champion in 2007, was fighting back from the time lost on the dust-coated opening stage when he stopped on stage three.

“We had a problem with a fuel leak and he had to stop in the stage,” said Nogier. “It was a very, very small leak but we lost a lot of fuel. It was something almost invisible and it was really difficult to find what the problem was.”

Nogier, who said a full analysis of the fuel leak problem would take place in order to establish the precise cause, confirmed Raikkonen’s Citroen DS3 WRC had briefly caught fire although there was little damage as a result of this.

Raikkonen elected not to restart under SupeRally rules this morning, even though his car had been repaired.

“Kimi took the decision to keep the car for the next rally, the last event of the season, which will be very important,” said Nogier. “We prefer not to take any risks to keep the full potential for the next rally.”