Last year Ferrari paid him 13.1 million pounds to not race. He should be able to float that $100K bill for awhile.

http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/200820...lary-list.html

What I have been reading, Kimi is NOT putting down 1 cent of his own money for this project. He has 3 some major scale sponsors.

Same thing with his deal with Citroen and WRC. He had "wings".

I am a half finn and thats so true and funny.

That would certainly make it less worriesome when wadding up a race car. :D

I'm really surprised that he's going to debut at Charlotte.

If he really wants to make a splash in Nascar, why not to it in their home town.

I may watch the truck race just to see how he does.

That is just a window into the costs of professional motorsports. A mid to backmarker team like Key Motorsports has per race packages starting at $50,000 per race. They finished 22nd in owner points last year

http://www.keymotorsports.us/show_truck.html

Another interesting cost: $20500 for a day of short track testing. Crash damage extra.

A team capable of winning is naturally a lot more.

Kimi is super quick no matter what he's driving. I remember a long time ago, we were having a night out and Kimi had just closed a deal with Sauber F1 team. We were in a night club ready to go and Kimi was in the mood for a little race against a guy who at the time was all over the news with his big time IT success and his new Lambo Diablo. This IT guy had also taken part in some small time racing and obviously wanted to test his skills against Kimi.

Kimi was driving his beat up Audi A3 1.8T with one off those tiny spare wheels due to and accident earlier that week. And off they went at 4AM Kimi in the audi and the IT guy in his brand new Lambo. We just stood there in the parking lot and listened to the sound of the Diablo somewhere in the distance. About 10 minutes later Kimi showed up and the guy in the Lamborghini followed him after another minute or so. Kimi was just laughing and having fun like he always is. Really nice guy and he also has a nice collection of cars and bikes.

And NasCar is just another way to have some fun. He once said that he'd like to do the LeMans 24h race and try rally and NasCar before he retires from racing.

And he seems to be doing pretty good with the lap times in the testing...

http://aol.sportingnews.com/nascar/s...car-truck-test

Racing those trucks will be a whole different story, but it'll be interesting to see how he'll do.

As my good friend Juhani has mentioned, Kimi already has some major, unnamed sponsors in the wings. The money that Kimi has banked over 9 years in Formula 1 (2009 - 2nd highest paid athlete in the WORLD), would bury what Kyle Busch has in his piggy bank. Kimi is not worried about cash.

Montoya has mentioned that he thought it quite odd that Raikkonen would choose Charlotte for his debut. Kimi will drive the guts out of those trucks, I've seen him purposely grenade an F1 car that was about to blow......a 9000 rpm engine with a mechanical valvetrain won't stand a chance!!

What worries me and others that have followed Kimi, are his mono-syllabic, one word, monotoned answers in a pre or postrace press conference. The American press, and NASCAR fans will eat him alive. Unless there is a side of him that has been squelched in the F1 and WRC world that we don't know about. Don't get me wrong, I would LOVE to see Kimi come to the U.S. and be successful (YES, I'm an American Finn, AND a longtime Raikkonen fan). The Camping World truck series is only a stepping stone, as he will leapfrog to the Nationwide series, and then on to the Cup cars.

This will be fun to watch in my opinion. :unibrow:

Hi my man Scott!

I was waiting when will you join in conversation.

I think he will do alright if just people let him do it hes way and on his time.

Here are couple Kimi commercial, he was an Finnish phone operator DNA is one of his sponsors and naturally he has made many adds for them:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jxIrfxTv28

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9wVtJWf6zc

Vaihtamalla paranee = Gets better when you chance

-"Ei ne suuret tulo vaan ne pienet menot!" means

-"it's not the big income, its the small expenses"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbI93pXXGvk&NR=1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQUO9...eature=related

http://www.iltalehti.fi/viihde/200707296407828_vi.shtml

He was in speed boat poker run but couldnt let be seen having "fun"(drinking in public) so little disguise was needet.

Sorry, that most of then are in native language.

,Juhani

With his "Slipping and Sliding" experience he should do OK.

It will still take some time though to catch up. Remember, his competition is the best of the best.

Scott
welders360