Hakkinen: Kimi should stay with McLaren.

With several teams vying for his services next year, Kimi Raikkonen has been urged to stay where he is for 2007 by former mentor and McLaren legend Mika Hakkinen.

The hottest property currently on the Formula One market, Raikkonen is said to be choosing between current team McLaren, Ferrari and Renault for his home for next year but two time champion Hakkinen told Crash.Net exclusively that he should give the British team the chance to show they can return to winning ways.

Raikkonen replaced Hakkinen at the wheel of a McLaren-Mercedes when he retired from the sport in 2002 and came close to championship glory in both 2003 and 2005. However, following a dip in form compared to Ferrari and Renault this year, Raikkonen is a driver with a price on his head and an eye on a change of scenery.

Hakkinen though believes Raikkonen should remain loyal to McLaren, insisting that he has not been there long enough to decide whether a better future lies with another squad.

"I decided to stay with McLaren when I was in Formula One and I stayed for many, many years and I won the World Championship twice," Hakkinen told Crash.Net Radio. "We had bad days, we had good days, we have medium days, we had everything!

"It was worthwhile though to focus and work in a team, push the team, be a team player and stay for the result that we wanted to have. In F1 you have to be very committed, consistent and have patience. You should not after two or three years make your mind up and decide that this isn't good.

"You have to look in the mirror and try and work hard to motivate the people working on the car, designing the car, including the mechanics so if I was Kimi I would stay with the team because McLaren is a fantastic team in many ways."