Kimi Raikkonen has said that the fact that himself and Valtteri Bottas are Finnish makes the story around their frequent clashes more interesting. The pair have come to blows a number of times on the track, starting in 2015.
The two collided in Russia of the aforementioned year, before again hitting each other in Mexico of 2016. This season, Spain and Azerbaijan has seen the two Finn's come together. Raikkonen believes that because they are from the same country, it makes it into a bigger story.
"We don't know each other very well, it's pretty much the same as with the other drivers, even if we're Finns," he said. "Because he's quite a bit younger we never raced each other until Formula One, but it's a bigger story because we're Finns.
"If one was a Finn and the other wasn't, it wouldn't be made such a big thing out of it – but it's far from ideal. It cost us a lot of points in the last race and it wasn't really our fault. But that's how it goes sometimes and it has happened a few times, sometimes my fault, sometimes his fault.
"It would be better if it would be in the other end of the starting grid. That's what happened in the last race, right at the start making our race very difficult, after a good start. It turned even worse later, again completely out of our hands, but situations like that happen sometimes."
Fergal Walsh
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