d motorofficial f motor_mag^125David Morley
“KIMI WAS FORCED TO STAND BY A LAKE
AND LOOK BORED, WHILE I GOT A MOTOR
COLUMN OUT OF THE WHOLE DREADFUL MESS”
I SCORED A THREE-MINUTE INTERVIEW s lot w it h K i m i R a i k k one n
the other day. Christ, what a train-wreck.
Now, I know that The Iceman (along with Meg Ryan and Lou
Reed, among others) is notoriously tricky to interrogate; given to
monosyllabic answers and a shrug of the shoulders when a civil,
considered verbal response might have been more enlightening for
anybody unfortunate enough to be watching. So I was expecting the
worst. I was anything but disappointed.
Held on the edge of Albert Park Lake in the run-up to the Melbourne
Grand Prix, I figured I’d do Kimi a favour and steer away from
questions about tyres and how his new Sauber/Alfa Romeo was going
to fare in the 2019 season opener. As in, questions he’d probably been
thrown a thousand times already that week. So, I went for a broader-
brush approach, bearing in mind the audience I was dealing with were
not your F1 hard-heads by any stretch.
W hich led me to ask Kimi a hypothetical: W hat single F1 rule change
he would like to make to improve the sport. Big mistake.
He looked at me like he’d just stepped in a microphone-shaped turd
and then replied: “I cannot make rule changes. We should not even
waste time talking about it”.
Oh sweet Jesus, this is going well. And it wasn’t that he simply didn’t
want to answer the question, it was the inference that it was the dopiest
question he’d ever heard. But I disagree. I was genuinely interested in
what a bloke with almost two decades’ experience in the sport reckons
could be changed to make it more spectacular, more exciting, more fun
and, ironically coming from KR, less robotic.So I blundered on: Was Formula 1 more fun in the old days, or do you
enjoy it more now?
“It is what I love to do, so I do it. I don’t enjoy it any more or less”.
And again: W ho has been your favourite driver to race against?
“I have to race every driver. There is no favourite.”
By now I can’t even help myself: Do you like Formula E?
“I have only seen it on TV, so I cannot say.”
Time to play my wildcard: Do you miss Bernie in Formula 1?
“I have seen him from time to time. He was always very kind to me.”
Thanks Kimi, and good luck on Sunday.
The PR girl shot me a tortured smile, Kimi shrugged and I played my
part by resisting the urge to push him into Albert Park Lake.
Okay, so that’s Kimi’s schtick, and I get it. But, mate, seriously, if you
don’t want to be interviewed, don’t do them. He’s probably not a bad
guy, but trying to make every interviewer (and I know I’m not special
enough to be the only one) look like an idiot is just being an arsehat.
Actually, there was one funny thing that did happen. As the camera
crew were mic-ing Kimi up, the zipper on his Team Alfa jacket broke
and unravelled from the bottom.
“Qualit y,” Kimi muttered.
Brilliant. He should stick with comedy and give The Iceman act the
f lick. And who’s laughing now any way? He was forced to stand by a
lake and look bored, while I got a MOTOR column out of the whole
dreadful mess.
And will this column guarantee that I’ll never be invited to interview
him again? Lord I hope so.