Vosgien test nets Kimi his first rally victory

Kimi Raikkonen says he is ready for his next World Rally Championship event after a successful test - and first rally win - on the Rallye Vosgien on Saturday.

The Citroen Junior Team has now planned all of its 15 official test days, which means the only alternative way of offering the Red Bull-backed Raikkonen experience of the kind of roads he will drive on in the Rally of France is for him to compete on rallies.

Rallye Vosgien was perfect for that experience. Based in a similar area to the next WRC qualifier, the roads were typical of what Raikkonen will see on the Strasbourg-based event.

Rallye Vosgien contained six stages, two separate tests run three times. Raikkonen was fastest throughout the day, comprehensively beating the low-level event of French national competitors in his Citroen C4 WRC.

Raikkonen said: “This was a good preparation for the Rally of France. From what I am told, the roads on this event were fairly representative of what we will see on the next WRC round, so I am happy. It’s also good to get back into driving the car on asphalt - that’s very useful as well.”

Raikkonen’s best performances have come on asphalt so far this season. He ran fourth overall on Rally Bulgaria, his first ever WRC qualifier and then collected his first scratch time on Rally Germany’s final test around Trier.

The Rally of France gets underway in Strasbourg in just over a week’s time - with the French round of the World Rally Championship running on the mainland, and not on the island of Corsica, for the first time ever.