Kimi Raikkonen will set a record for the most races in history at the Zandwold circuit in the Netherlands next weekend as the Finn joined F1 in 2001 and has played 344 races at the spa station as of last weekend.
Raikkonen was snatched away by Peter Sauber after only 23 low-level races in his entire career, when there was a lot of talk about whether the inexperienced driver had any competition in the world's top motorsport. The shy Finn finished the race with a point on his australian debut and has since won 21 wins, 18 pole positions and, of course, a world title.
Let's take a look back at the classic moment of Kimi's victory:
10. 2007 British Grand Prix
The race at Silverstone was supposed to be about McLaren's rookie superstar Lewis Hamilton, who won the pole position of his first home grand prix with an astonishing lap in qualifying, which excited his new fans.
But on match day, Raikkonen, who finished second in qualifying, finally won the championship. In the first few laps, he glued hamilton like glue, and then when the young Briton first pitted a little slower, Kimi completed the overcut. It was his third win in his first season at Ferrari.
9. 2003 Malaysian Grand Prix
Raikkonen's debut season in F1 was impressive, and all the fears about his inexperience quickly dissipated, so much so that Ron Dennis hand-picked Raikkonen, then 21, to succeed Mika Hakinen, who would take a year off and eventually retire.
Unfortunately for Raikkonen, his first year at McLaren was a Ferrari extravaganza, with Ferrari winning all but two races in 2002.
But by 2003, Adrian Niue had his magic spell again, and after taking the podium for australia's first race of the season, Raikkonen scored his first victory in the malaysian race that followed. Starting from sixth place, he benefited from entanglement between Michael Schumacher and David Coothard to beat Rubens Barrichello and Fernando Alonso by almost 40 seconds to take the lead for the first game.
Although it was his only victory of the season, he made eight consecutive podium appearances, and in the end he missed the championship with only two points away, losing to Schumacher.
8. 2007 Australian Grand Prix
Fangio, Andretti, Mansell are all the legendary f1 drivers who won ferrari debuts. At the 2007 Australian Grand Prix, Raikkonen joined Ferrari for its first race.
Raikkonen scored pole position and red victory in his first race, and although he faced prolonged pressure from McLaren's duo of Alonso and Hamilton, the victory was even more impressive considering McLaren's speed advantage in the winter test.
7. 2009 Belgian Grand Prix
It's a season that belongs to the dual diffuser and kers system, and the order in the paddock has changed completely. McLaren and Ferrari have been the dominant teams for the championship since the late 1990s, but with Brown and Red Bull rising, both teams have fallen into a trough.
But Ferrari did have a victory that year, in Spa, Kimi won in a chaotic Belgian Grand Prix. From sixth place, he found himself behind daredevil Giancarlo Fischera. In the first lap of the crash, four cars withdrew and safety cars came out. At the restart of the race, Raikkonen overtook Fischera on the Kemer straights to take the lead and ultimately won.
6. 2007 Brazilian Grand Prix
Going into the 2007 title race, few people talked about Kimi Raikkonen, instead, all the focus was on the infighting between McLaren's Hamilton and Alonso.
It is worth noting that when the season came to the final race in Brazil, Hamilton led Alonso in the drivers' standings. Raikkonen is three points behind Alonso and seven points behind Hamilton, and he seems to be an outsider in terms of winning the title.
In this race, Lady Luck favored Kimi, the Finn started in third place, overtaking Hamilton in the first corner, while the Briton then drove off the track, after which the situation got worse, because of the transmission problem he dropped to 18th. In the end Alonso was third, Hamilton was only seventh, and the winner was Kimi's. Kimi completed the Great Comeback of the Century in 2007 while winning the championship that season, the only championship of his driver's career.
5. 2013 Australian Grand Prix
After two years of rallying, Raikkonen returned to F1 in 2012 with the Lotus. This was the peak of Sebastian Vettel's dominance over Red Bull.
Due to the excellent speed performance of the e21 car and the tires were not easy to wear, the team chose to let him adopt a two-stop strategy, while the other competitors all stopped three times, and he swept the opponent from the seventh place, achieving an impressive victory.
It was the French team's most recent victory until Ocon won the race for the team at the Hungarian Grand Prix this season.
4. 2018 Season American Grand Prix
On that day in 2013, when Raikkonen won the race across the finish line in Melbourne, he couldn't imagine he would be on the podium again five years later, especially considering he returned to Ferrari in 2014.
In September 2018, he won a brilliant victory in Austin. Starting from second place, he beat Hamilton to achieve his last stop-and-so-far victory with a one-stop strategy, one of the most popular in recent years. However, in that season, Kimi was abandoned by Ferrari.
3. 2012 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix
"Don't bother me, I know what to do." It was perhaps the most iconic team during the Grand Prix, but Raikkonen proved he did know what he was doing after this super victory in Abu Dhabi, his first victory since returning to f1 after a two-year absence.
He has already won six podiums that season, which shows he hasn't lost any speed, but under the lights of the Jasmarina circuit, it's put him back to peak for the first time since the Belgian Grand Prix three years ago.
He started from fourth and moved up to second ahead of Turn 1, trailing Hamilton. At the time, the McLaren driver's engine problems were overtaken by Kimi, ahead of title contenders Alonso and Vettel.
2. 2004 Belgian Grand Prix
Looking back at the 2004 season, it can be called the most boring season in the history of F1, and Ferrari's f2004 was so dusty that other teams could not reach it. The 2004 season was about Michael Schumacher and Ferrari, who dominated the whole year. But on the day Schumacher won his seventh and final world title ahead of schedule, it wasn't the conquering German who won the race, but Raikkonen.
In one of the dynamic races, there was plenty of drama on the Spa-Franco Camps circuit – as evidenced by three safety car sorties and 11 car retirements.
But from 10th, Raikkonen maintained his typical composure amid the chaos surrounding him, taking McLaren's only victory of the season, the second victory of his career, and kimi began his reputation as king of Spa.
1. 2005 Japanese Grand Prix
The race was characterized by Alonso beating Schumacher on the outside of the dreaded 130r bend, but Raikkonen also made his own brilliant move on the German masters, where the young racers in F1 showed they were not intimidated by anyone's reputation and he made it to Turn 1 from the outside of Ferrari.
From the 17th start of qualifying after the rain, Raikkonen knew he would not be the world champion of the year, but this did not slow him down in the slightest, until the last pit stop, he was still 5 seconds behind the leader Fischera.
Since then, he has been attacking the Italians lap after lap until the last lap, overtaking Fischiera, into Turn 1, where he finally won.
It was enough to thrill Raikkonen, who swung his fists again and again in the cockpit after crossing the finish line for victory, the last victory he won for McLaren before moving to Ferrari.