In his own words: The secret to Raikkonen's F1 longevity

Does a 40-year-old driver deserve a spot at the pinnacle of motorsport when there are countless young hopefuls trying to break through? Should a driver with two points in 11 races in 2020 keep their seat for next year? Is one win in seven years, and 21 in total, an accurate reflection of prodigious ability? Is one title enough to be a Formula 1 legend?

Does Kimi Raikkonen care about any of the above? Of course he doesn't. Raikkonen, the Iceman, has made a career out of not caring. It's his niche, what makes him a cult hero (a status perhaps aided by his world title triumph being 13 years ago). He's a driver who says what he thinks, if anything, and doesn't care if anyone is listening.

But this is the thing - Raikkonen has just become F1's most experienced driver of all time. Even if motorsport wasn't naturally geared towards statistical salivation, the list of names to have held that accolade is impressive. To name but a few: Juan Manuel Fangio, Graham Hill... now Raikkonen.

Ahead of him clinching the record for world championship grand prix starts, Autosport got the chance to speak to Raikkonen in a rare (thanks to 2020's restrictive unpleasantness) face-to-face interview. After establishing that he firmly, and unsurprisingly, doesn't care about taking the mantle of F1's most experienced from Rubens Barrichello ("No, not really," is his response to our opening question. "If somebody would ask me the number, I have no idea - I've never really looked how many races I've done or how many others have done") and that again, he's "not really" bothered by how he's remembered, we ask Raikkonen to take us back 19 years.

At the 2001 Australian Grand Prix, Raikkonen, then aged 21, graduated straight to F1 as reigning Formula Renault UK champion, after just two years of car racing. In Melbourne that year, as Michael Schumacher won for Ferrari, Raikkonen raced to seventh at the flag from 13th on the grid in his first race for Sauber. He was upgraded to sixth and a debut point when BAR's Oliver Panis was handed a post-race penalty for overtaking under yellow flags.

"It was nice," he recalls. "There was a lot of talk about my superlicence or whatever it was [called] at that time. I always assumed you got it and then you have it, but then there was some [problem, with people saying:], 'Oh yeah, you have for two races or three races and this and that.' But I didn't care, basically.

"Going to Australia the first time - everything is new and testing is a different story but it was OK. I enjoyed it and I think we could have done better even [in the race], but we were happy to get the point in the first race. After that you kind of relax and all this nonsense stuff kind of stopped."

Since his successful F1 debut, Raikkonen has gone on to start 322 more races, take those 21 wins, secure 82 further podiums and score 18 poles. He's raced for four more teams (McLaren, Ferrari twice, Lotus and his current Alfa Romeo squad) and of course triumphed for the Prancing Horse in that sensational title battle against warring McLaren rivals Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso in 2007. There were also two years spent rallying and sampling NASCAR after being paid out of his Ferrari contract for 2010, before his successful F1 comeback with Lotus in 2012.

In all that time, F1 has changed. In terms of major regulation changes, there was 2005's one-tyre rule (one of Raikkonen's two lost championships, with 2003 arguably the other), the move to slash downforce for 2009, the introduction of the high-degradation Pirellis in 2011, the start of the turbo-hybrid era in 2014, the downforce revival of 2017.

Raikkonen's career stretches back to F1's first-to-sixth, 10-points-to-one scoring system, which ran from 1991-2002, with the system altered in 2003 to take points down to eighth, and then the 25-points-to-one system for the top 10 adopted in 2010. But for Raikkonen, through all that, one thing has stayed the same.

"I don't think that your driving does [change]," he muses. "Like, how you're driving. Driving is similar. OK, regulations change and then from year to year the cars change and sometimes you have a better car than others, and obviously it's easier to drive when you have a better car."

"F1 has never been the most important thing in my life" Kimi Raikkonen

So, can he pick out one standout memory of F1's ever-changing nature? "The biggest difference probably was when there was a tyre war with the Michelin and Bridgestone [between 2001 and 2006]. Obviously then we did a lot of tyre testing - like in one day we could test 30 sets of tyres, different [compounds] and then basically teams could choose [and say], 'OK I want this front constructional softness and this for the rear.' And there were more set-up tools [then] and obviously the tyres got really good because they were pushing each other, the two companies.

"That was really nice. It was some different element we don't have anymore. [Now] we do our normal set-up on this and that work, but it was like an extra thing that we could play around [with] and then [the team said], 'OK, this tyre fits this car better.' The next team could choose from 30 or 20 different tyres [as well]. OK, we had to do a lot of testing with them, but it was nice."

Raikkonen's 2007 title triumph in Brazil, where Ferrari team-mate Felipe Massa had led for most of the race, is undoubtedly the crowning glory of his career. And yet there remains a suggestion - given his age when he started at the top level, his longevity in the championship and abundance of talent - that one F1 title is an underwhelming return.

The 2003 and 2005 campaigns are Raikkonen's famous near-misses. In the former, the season's best overall package - the F2003-GA, which was only introduced by Ferrari after four races - and arguably its best driver, Michael Schumacher, came out on top (that year's other title contender, Williams's Juan Pablo Montoya, picked up the International Racing Driver prize at the 2003 Autosport Awards). Raikkonen and McLaren won once to Schumacher's six victories, but stayed in the hunt with a string of runner-up places, and ultimately came up two points short.

In 2005, Alonso and Renault walked away with both titles, while engine reliability problems thwarted Raikkonen and McLaren. Despite matching Alonso on seven wins, points lost through DNFs and grid penalties meant he finished 21 adrift. Inevitably, he doesn't feel frustrated not to be sitting in the Monza meeting room as a double or even triple world champion.

"[In] 2003 we should never have been that many times on the podium [10] and be between the two Ferraris," he explains, sanguinely. "But we managed to hang in there and to get the maximum out of it. And there was a lot of good races."

It seems, however, that Raikkonen does reflect on his defeat to Alonso at least a little differently. "We had a good package, but then we had even more issues," he says. "But I don't really... I'm sure in those times it was frustrating to... break the engine and stuff, get this 10-place penalty [at the French, British, Italian and Japanese GPs], or break it during the race or something happens [to the car reliability].

"But you know that's how it goes and afterwards, honestly, being once or five times [world champion] - it makes zero difference. At least we gave a good challenge and came out once with it [the title]. All the years has been good fights at least."

'All the years': 18 seasons since 2001, split across those 19 times around the sun. That's a lot of F1, especially for a driver famous for giving short shrift to the elements of the championship's complex nature he finds so tiresome.

For some drivers, the racing is enough. Adrenalin, from the speed or competition, is addictive. Some have a desperate need to prove they are the best. For others, it's the simple joy of winning. For more, money. Raikkonen has his own, not-so-subtle, secret to F1 longevity.

"For me, F1 has never been the most important thing in my life," he says, bluntly. "It's for sure taking the most of the time in my life. When I come to races, I think all the time the things that should 'this or that' improve here or there. It's like [a] never-ending story. It's always been like that. But when I go out of here and I go home, I never... I have my own life and it's never been part of it really. Obviously, I do my training and stuff but it's two completely different things. So that's why I think also I enjoy it more because if it would be 24 hours, seven days a week, then I wouldn't be here today.

"But always it's been two separate things. And people can say, 'Oh, it's the wrong approach.' Well, for me it works and I don't care what people say - as long as it works for you. And it has kept me excited about the thing. I've done my stuff as well as I can and given everything when it's needed. But not every day because my life is demanding.

"So, on that side, even coming now these days [in 2020] it's still similar things. To me it hasn't really changed much. In the past I didn't have a family; now I have a family, but it still works the same way. So, I go home, I have my family - we do normal things and when I come here, I do my work."

It has long been known that Raikkonen belongs to the camp of being driven by the enjoyment of driving. He's done it in F1 for nearly half his life ("In one way it's a bit sad but that's how it goes!" he laughs towards the end of our chat).

"When we were kids, we had a lot of freedom to use the welding machines and all kind of things. Our parents let us do a lot of things - sometimes destroy my mum's bike and take parts from it, and they were not too happy" Kimi Raikkonen

But there's another element that clearly keeps him interested. It's one that rarely comes up in conversation - it's not delivered in a stinging radio rebuke, after all - but Raikkonen enjoys the challenge of fixing and improving the F1 machines he drives. That doesn't mean he's in the garage all night with his Alfa mechanics, although in early 2019 he drew sketches for changes to his brake pedal, but tinkering for improvements has long been a part of his life.

"I enjoy the racing part," he says when asked to describe what he loves about F1. "And I think over the years more even. But also the challenge to try to improve, to try to fix issues and make the car better. Obviously, with more experience it comes easier, but then it's always difficult to find those small areas to improve. I've never been a big fan of the other stuff, but the racing and the trialling part, always. I liked it enough at least to want to keep going and I guess it's the feeling of going racing and trying to do the best that you can.

"When we were kids [Raikkonen has an older brother, Rami, who entered one Word Rally event, the 2001 Rally Finland], we had a lot of freedom to use the welding machines and all kind of things. Our parents let us do a lot of things - sometimes destroy my mum's bike and take parts from it, and they were not too happy! But, in general, we had a lot of freedom on that side to try things and it's always been part of it.

"I've never been shy of dirtying my hands and fixing something myself. And if I had more time I would like to do it more, but with racing [full time] and doing F1 I was busy and then now with a family it doesn't really feel right that I go home and go for five hours fixing something on my own!"

Much of Raikkonen's fame may be based on his no-nonsense, non-caring attitude, but his commitment to F1 is clear. No one does one thing for so long unless it works for them. But throughout his career, Raikkonen has also displayed clear commitment to individuals.

Since 2002, he's worked with trainer Mark Arnall, a relationship he calls "more friendship than anything else [now]", and then there's his long-term manager, Steve Robertson, who secured Raikkonen's first test with Sauber at Mugello in September 2000, after some initial talks with Jordan. Raikkonen has also forged strong bonds with his engineers, especially Mark Slade, who he persuaded to rejoin the then-Lotus squad from Mercedes ahead of his 2012 F1 comeback from his two years in the wider motorsport arena. At Lotus, they worked with performance engineer Julien Simon-Chautemps - now Raikkonen's Alfa race engineer.

Such commitment is part of the reason why Alfa (then minus the road car company's branding as Sauber, which it remains at its core to this day) hired Raikkonen in the first place. And he's clearly not just out to complete the basics of the job, as evidenced by his explanation of his Tuscan GP pitlane penalty. Raikkonen still has plenty of savvy racecraft to offer what these days is a 'Class C' team (Alfa leads that unofficial championship against back-of-the-grid rivals Haas and Williams by 89 points, with Raikkonen heading the fictional drivers' table).

During his time out of F1, Raikkonen says he "didn't look that many [times to see what was going on]", adding: "I looked at the races if it happened to be on TV. I came to Monaco but for a completely different reason than for the race! I don't think I saw any cars live. Formula 2 in the morning - when I came back from the bar!"

But he was more than just paying attention again when he made his famous and successful comeback with Lotus. Autosport senses a certain amount of satisfaction at the two wins Raikkonen scored at the now-Renault-soon-to-be-Alpine Enstone squad, plus his third-place finish in the 2012 championship. It's telling that he picks his Australia 2013 triumph as a bonus offering when we ask him to consider his best races. This was a move that paid off - which hasn't always been the case in Raikkonen's F1 career, particularly when considering his second Ferrari stint alongside first Alonso and then Sebastian Vettel.

PLUS: Kimi Raikkonen's top 10 F1 races ranked

"No, not really, no," he says of having any regrets regarding the major choices he's had to make during his F1 tenure. "I mean, I've been in good teams in general over the years and I think in the long run it has played out pretty well. You never obviously know, when you make decisions to go to a different team, how it's gonna play out.

"When I came out from rally [and went] back to F1 people probably said, 'Oh, we have no chance', but we proved them very wrong many times. It's always a gamble. The team that's been winning previously could be not that great next year.

"So, you try to make the best out of it, and I think, whatever the issues are, we need to try to solve them and fix it and go forwards. It's not like you give up if the first race is bad [and you say], 'OK, the year is done.' It's been working out OK, as I expected probably, so that's the main thing."

There's no disputing that the end of the F1 road for the championship's latest most-experienced driver is "more closer than the beginning!", as Raikkonen acknowledges with a laugh. His initial two-year Alfa contract is up at the end of 2020 and, although nothing has been officially announced at the time of writing, he has been linked with an extension into 2021. But when the end does come - this year, next year, whenever - will that be the last time he is seen in the F1 sphere?

"I don't know. Probably... [it] depends," comes the typical staccato response. "Obviously I will never do any commentating or anything, that's for sure. But you never know what happens. And if there's some work, obviously I'd try to keep coming to the track [with it] for sure. [But] my kids, they are both interested in the sport and so if they want to come one day, we should come. But I wouldn't say that I'm desperate to come because I do try to enjoy them with other things than that."

Sooner or later, F1 will have to assess Raikkonen's legacy, even if he still has time to add a bit more history.

He won't hold onto the record he doesn't care about for long if he does stop, this year or next. The returning Alonso, who also made his debut in Australia in 2001, will be 18 races behind Raikkonen's total if the Finn starts all of the remaining scheduled races in 2020.

But Raikkonen's world champion status will never disappear - even if one title probably understates his speed, particularly in the opening years of his F1 story.

Raikkonen simply does what he enjoys. And that's why, right now, he's still at it.