Eric Boullier has downplayed talk of Lotus launching a title run despite Kimi Raikkonen claiming the first win of the season.

A two-stop strategy and superior pace in the closing laps saw Raikkonen pip Fernando Alonso to the Australian GP victory by 12 seconds. Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel was a further 10 of the pace.

But despite what Raikkonen billed as an “easy” win on Sunday, Boullier says his team is chasing a top finish but not the very top spot.

Asked if Lotus were ‘definitely in a position’ to challenge for the title, the Lotus boss toldAutosport: ”No.

“The only thing that I am focusing on is that we have clearly stated we want to be a top team.

“Starting the season like this means we will fight with everything for the Championship, but it is too early to say anything other than Lotus is a top team now.

“And if every year we are putting ourselves in a situation where we can compete for wins, then you can build up from the nice momentum to maybe be Champion again.”

Kimi Raikkonen could hardly have wished for a better start to the 2013 season as he won the Australian GP without too much fuss.

The Lotus driver qualified P7, but he negotiated his way to fourth place by the end of the third lap and then held station behind the Red Bull of Sebastian Vettel and the Ferraris of Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso.

However, the momentum swung his way during the second round of pit stops as Lotus put him on a two-stop strategy with the rest of the front-runners all doing three-stoppers.

Although there were fears that Alonso, who finished second, was going to catch him after he switched to fresh rubber late in the race, the challenge never came as Raikkonen eased his way to his second race win following his comeback.

The 33-year-old Raikkonen says their plan worked like a charm and it turned into “one of the easiest race wins” for him in the end as he finished more than 12s ahead of the Spaniard.

“Our plan was to do two stops and though it’s always difficult in the first races to know when to stop and not go too early, we got it exactly right,” he said. “We followed the plan and it worked out perfectly for us. I could save the tyres and go fast if I needed.

“It was one of the easiest races I have done to win. Hopefully we can have many more of these races.”

He added: “Fernando was catching me at some points when I was taking it a bit more easy and I had some traffic, so I just wanted to make sure that if the rain came or anything I had a bit more of a gap.

“It was a pretty nice race, not so difficult.”

Although pleased to be the surprise leader in the Drivers’ Championship after the season-opening race in Melbourne, Raikkonen concedes there’s still a long way to go.

“It feels good but it’s only one race so it doesn’t really change our aim or our work,” he said. “We’re happy with the win and there’s a lot still to do to try to win the Championship.”

Meanwhile team principal Eric Boullier is delighted with the way Raikkonen managed his tyres throughout the race.

“We’re most delighted – it was the best start we could have had to the season. Not only is it a win, but the strategy we chose also worked,” he said on BBC Sport.

“Reduced tyre wear was one of the strengths of the car that we inherited from last season and it was useful because during Kimi’s second stint the other cars were starting to challenge a bit more.”