Abu Dhabi GP: Kimi Raikkonen says Lotus can unlock four tenths

The Lotus driver struggled with the handling of his car during practice on Friday, but admitted he was surprised by how quick he was given his problems.

Raikkonen, running the new Coanda-style exhausts, finished the second session in sixth position, some seven tenths of a second behind pace-setter Sebastian Vettel.

The Finn is hopeful he will get closer to the front if he can solve the issues that hindered him today.

"We tried the new exhausts and didn't really change the car a lot apart from those parts, and it didn't feel very nice," he said.

"But the laptime seems pretty OK still. I am a bit surprised how good the time was when it wasn't very nice to drive.

"Hopefully we can improve and it should mean that we can get a bit closer even than where we are today.

"I think for sure there should be four tenths, I would say, if you get the things right, but unfortunately it is not often you get those things right.

"It is usually a bit compromised here and there, but last race we had a very nice car until we changed the set-up and it was not exactly like we wanted. But if we have a similar feeling with the car it should be good."

Despite being the last driver to set a time with the softer Pirelli tyres, Raikkonen said he had no issues with the rubber, although he did not complete any long runs.

"They were OK, but I think the car overall was not maybe as good as we wanted and it always makes it a bit more tricky then," he said.

"But I think the tyres seem to be fine so far - they were working fine and we didn't see any issues.

"We didn't have time to do a long run, we just wanted to make sure that we could compare [tyres]."