Raikkonen still not ruling out F1 return

The 2007 F1 world champion, who retired from the sport in 2009 following his third season at Ferrari, has been linked to possible F1 returns for the past couple of years, first with Red Bull Racing and most recently with Renault.

The Finn has spent the last couple of seasons in the World Rally Championship and this weekend he enters his first NASCAR race, competing in the Truck Series for frontrunner Kyle Busch Motorsports.

When asked at Charlotte Motor Speedway about how far he wanted to get with his NASCAR experience, Raikkonen told reporters he does not have any firm plans beyond next week, when AUTOSPORT has learned he may enter his first Nationwide Series race.

"I don't have any big plans, I don't have any plans for next year in anything that I do," said Raikkonen. "I'll see how it is because I didn't have any expectation when I came here [to NASCAR]. It's a bit like when I went to rallying. It's the same story here, for sure it's a different sport and different racing than what we have in Europe but it's very popular here.

"I had the plan to do rally this year so this [NASCAR] is really when I have time... If I completely suck here probably there's no reason to come back so hopefully it goes better than today. I don't know yet. We go day by day and see how it goes. What comes in the future, it comes."

Raikkonen was emphatic in saying has not closed the door completely on a possible return to F1.

"There were many reasons why I stopped [in F1]," said Raikkonen. "I always said that I don't know if it's going to be forever or not but after that I wasn't really missing Formula 1. I wanted to try other things and I had a perfect opportunity to go and do rally and learn that and now I have time to come here and see how NASCAR is.

"I'm happy how things are now but I never really have said that I'm never going to go back [to F1]. Maybe I will never go, maybe I'll go, but only the future will tell.

"Like I said before I have no plans for next year. I never really had any plans for this year before January so it may get quite late to know exactly what I will do."

Besides his NASCAR outings, Raikkonen will continue to compete for his own Ice 1 Racing team in the WRC. His next rally will be the Acropolis in Greece next month.