Kimi will lend a hand

ESPNstar.com - Friday 5th September 2008
Kimi Raikkonen has revealed he will offer a helping hand to Felipe Massa in the F1 world title race should the need arise. Although team orders are banned in F1, a driver can opt to act of his own accord, as witnessed earlier this year in the German Grand Prix.
On that occasion, Heikki Kovalainen was informed McLaren team-mate Lewis Hamilton was considerably quicker than him late on in the race. Kovalainen made a decision to let Hamilton pass, allowing the 23-year-old to mount a charge and take the chequered flag.
With the title race in limbo, Raikkonen appreciates there may come a time when he will defer to Ferrari team-mate Massa to help the Brazilian's title push. At present, with a third of the season remaining, Raikkonen is 13 points adrift of leader Hamilton and seven behind Massa.
"It can happen," replied reigning world champion Raikkonen when asked if at a stage late in the season he would help Massa fight for the title.
"It all depends on how the next few races go and where we are at the end of the year, but we race as a team. We will see.
"Hopefully we won't end up in that situation, and hopefully I will be in the championship up to the last race.
"But you never know what can happen."
Raikkonen has had his problems that have left him chasing his title rivals, notably in the last race in Valencia when his engine blew. The Finn is hoping the issues that have left him languishing behind Massa in qualifying and in the races of late have been eradicated, and he can push on again. "There has been a problem, but it is not the first time and it is not the end of life," added Raikkonen, aiming for a fourth consecutive Belgian Grand Prix victory on Sunday.
"Things go wrong sometimes, and we've been trying to fix that. You have bad races.
"Hopefully we have found something now and we can get back to where we should be and have a stronger weekend." Ferrari believe last week's test in Monza was highly beneficial to the 28-year-old, and that he should be back on the pace in Spa this weekend.
"We tried many things and were pretty happy with the car, but you never know from a test," said Massa.
"It can be a good test, then you come to the next place and it is a different circuit with different conditions.
"We came away with a good feeling from the test, and hopefully we have found something and we can be stronger, but it is too early to say. We will see."