Korean GP: Kimi Raikkonen calm about Lotus resurgence chances

The Lotus driver qualified fifth at Yeongam, his best qualifying result since the Belgian Grand Prix.

That return to coincided coincided with his outfit successfully introducing a raft of updates, including the Coanda-effect exhausts.

With Raikkonen currently lying 37 points behind Fernando Alonso in the title chase, he cannot afford to lose much more ground if he is to remain a realistic championship contender.

But although he appears to have the machinery to fight the cars ahead of him, Raikkonen says his only mindset is simply to try his best - rather than build up his expectations.

"We'll try our best and see what happens," he said. "The race might end at the first corner, you never know.

"Hopefully we can get a result but you cannot really say 'we will finish in this position'. We have a chance to do well but things can easily go wrong and then you get nothing.

"We'll try to do our best and see what we end up with."

Raikkonen thinks the benefits of the new exhaust layout will increase in future races as Lotus learns how to extract its potential and balance the downforce benefits with the loss of power.

"We are slower in a straight line because you lose a bit of power with these things," he said. "I think with more races and more practice we'll probably learn something more and can improve it.

"It's maybe not as good as we expected in a perfect situation, but it's still a good start."