Kimi Raikkonen has been officially announced as a Ferrari driver for 2014. Will Mark Slade take the reins on the pitwall as his race engineer?

The rapport between driver and engineer is one of the most crucial relationships within any Formula 1 team and with Raikkonen’s move away from Lotus speculation has been rife as to who will take over as the monosyllabic Finn’s race engineer.  Rumoured to be in the running is current race engineer, Mark Slade.

The Raikkonen/Slade relationship goes back quite a ways. Mark Slade first became Raikkonen’s primary race engineer in 2002, his first season at McLaren. Slade continued as Raikkonen’s engineer throughout all five seasons at McLaren.

Raikkonen’s first three seasons at Ferrari were shared between Chris Dyer (2007 – 2008) and Fernando Alonso’s current engineer, Andrea Stella (2009).

A brief partnership with Simon Rennie at Lotus in 2012 was responsible for the now infamous “just leave me alone, I know what I’m doing” radio message. However,  in 2013 Raikkonen once again teamed up with Mark Slade. It comes as no surprise then that Slade is rumoured to be moving with Raikkonen to Ferrari.

Felipe Massa’s race engineer, Rob Smedley, has been linked with a move to Williams but may yet end up with the Brazilian at his next team.

Photo: Lotuscars.com