This year Kimi Räikkönen hands over the baton to Fernando Alonso as the oldest driver on the grid, both of whom have also contested the most Grand Prix in the history of the category.
Kimi raikkonen He is already enjoying his retirement with his family, so Fernando Alonso will be at the beginning of the 2022 season the oldest driver on the grid with 40 years and 334 Grand Prix races in Formula 1.
In fact, if everything goes smoothly, the Spanish rider will become the one who has played the most races in history of the category when the traffic lights go out at the Russian Grand Prix next September, with Alonso having already turned 41 years old.
parallel races
The truth is that the trajectories of Fernando Alonso Y Kimi raikkonen in Formula 1 they have many similarities. Both debuted at the 2001 Australian Grand Prix, the Spanish with Minardi and the Finnish with Sauber.
Both drove for McLaren, Ferrari and the popularly called Team Enstone; Alonso in two stages (Renault and Alpine) and Räikkönen during the Lotus period.
Equally, both took two years off from Formula 1 (Räikkönen after being replaced by Alonso at Ferrari between 2010 and 2011 and Alonso between 2019 and 2020), also taking advantage of the two to compete in other disciplines; the Finn in the WRC and NASCAR and the Spanish in the WEC, IndyCar and Raids.
Statistics and data of Alonso and Räikkönen in Formula 1
companions and rivals
Kimi Räikkönen and Fernando Alonso were direct rivals during the first years of both in Formula 1, this rivalry reaching its peak in 2005, when both disputed the world title.
That season, with the Finn aboard a very fast but fragile McLaren and the Spaniard driving a much more consistent Renault, Alonso ended up becoming world champion for the first time.
Räikkönen would achieve it in front of Alonso himself and Lewis Hamilton in the convulsive 2007 season, in which he knew how to take full advantage of the internal struggle that arose at McLaren.
Later, when Räikkönen returned to Ferrari in 2014, the two became Teammates, being the Spanish much superior throughout a season in which the Italian squad could not be competitive.
The duel between the two, of which we had some last brushstrokes last year in the middle of the grid with Alonso in Alpine and Räikkönen in Alfa Romeo, will not happen again, but without a doubt both have always enjoyed it and will keep it fondly in their memories.