Raikkonen takes blame for pitstop blunder

The world champion injured a mechanic when he set off before the fuel nozzle had been removed during his seconds pitstop.

Raikkonen admitted it was his own fault.

"There is not much to say. I left (the pits) a bit too early," he told reporters after the race.

"It was my fault and unfortunately I ran over the guy who was refuelling. We need to look and see what really happened."

Although the incident dropped Raikkonen to sixth place, in the end it mattered little, as the Finn retired when his engine exploded on lap 46.

The Ferrari driver dropped to third place in the standings, now 13 points behind Lewis Hamilton.

Raikkonen, however, believes his championship chances are still good.

"I am fine. I was not a nice weekend but it is not the first time," he said. "We are in a bit of a worse situation in the championship but if we get all the things sorted then I think we still have a chance to come back. We just need to get things as we want and try again."

The world champion did concede he needs to sort his qualifying problems quickly if he is to have a shot at retaining the crown.

"We need to get things sorted in qualifying," he added. "I think we still have a good chance, but we do the best that we can in the next races and then we will see where we are.

"We know what the issues have been, but unfortunately we haven't been able to sort them out. Hopefully now in the next test we can work a bit and try to find the solution for it. If we get the qualifying right it will help a lot."