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IN PROFILE
Daniel Ricciardo
1
Being paired with F1’s most
exciting young driver earlier
this season didn’t phase Daniel
Ricciardo. In fact, it made him
better. So what does he really
think of the Max hype?
And can Red Bull topple the
mighty Mercedes in 2017?
We sat Ricciardo down for an
exclusive one-on-one.
1. Ricciardo is one of
the coolest, and
most popular guys
in the paddock.
Red Bull Content Pool
2. In his own brutal
assessment, the
Austrian GP wasn’t
a classic for the Aussie.
XPB Images
This has been an
extraordinary
season for
Daniel Ricciardo.
It started
with some
frustration,
and then the
surprise arrival at Red Bull Racing of
Max Verstappen – who won first time
out when a strategy call went his way
rather than Daniel’s.
Then there was Monaco, where the
Aussie was set for a sensational win
before the team botched his pitstop.
More disappointment followed until
things began to turn around when he
finished on the podium in Hungary.
After that things generally went
Ricciardo’s way as he put in a series
of great drives, and in Malaysia luck
favoured him when Lewis Hamilton’s
late engine failure handed him his
first GP win since 2014. All in all, he
secured a creditable third in the World
Championship, right behind the allconquering
Mercedes duo.
ADAM COOPER:
How would you sum up the
2016 season?
ROMAIN GROSJEAN:
I think it’s definitely been a good
season.
I’ve been pleased with both
aspects, firstly the team’s progress
and rate of development, and success
rate of development.
They’re always pushing to put
new parts on the car, but last year it
didn’t seem that we had a massive
success rate, a lot of parts we put on
didn’t really give us what we wanted.
This year most things we’ve put on
have been, ‘wow that’s good’.
So team progress has been great.
And I think personally I’ve been
driving well. It’s hard to have a
perfect 21 races, but I think I can
count three I wasn’t particularly
happy with, and then the rest I’ve
fulfilled everything I could. So from
that side I’m really happy.
You mentioned the chassis
last year; Renault tended to
get the blame for the team’s
performance, but there
was more to it than that
wasn’t there?
We definitely started last year with
the power unit a long way off, the
driveability was pretty bad. But then
once that got better we found some
weaknesses in the chassis as well.
This year it came
alive, it felt a lot
more like 2014.
Even little things like braking, for
example. It was a strength in 2014,
just getting the car stopped well and
turned helps.
Renault has made a step,
because you wouldn’t be in
the position you’re in now
without that. But equally
you’ve been a long way ahead
of the works team, which
must be encouraging on the
chassis side.
Absolutely. Some races we’ve been
qualifying top three, while the others
have been out in Q1. It’s been cool,
Renault and TAG have done some
good work.
Again, Brazil last year I had an
update, and it was slower. This year
everything they’ve brought has been
better. I think from both the chassis and
power unit side it’s aligned well, and it’s
been going in the right direction.”
2
You said earlier there were
three races you weren’t happy
with – which ones?
Austria I just sort of struggled on the
Sunday, so that one wasn’t a strong
race. Silverstone, I wasn’t happy
with it, but it was probably more the
circumstances – the VSC put me back,
and it was just a frustrating race. I felt
that I had more to give, but I couldn’t.
That was two in a row that I was
a bit frustrated with.
But you still finished fifth
and fourth!
Last year I would have taken a fifth
and a fourth every weekend!
Even so, it’s cool that our standards
have risen now, and we’re expecting
more. But I think with self-evaluation
after the weekend they are probably
two which I could maybe have made
it a better weekend.
The other was Japan. Probably
a bit like Silverstone, a lot of it I felt
was circumstances. I never really
got going. I didn’t feel through fault
of my own again, just got a bit stuck
behind Perez at the start, didn’t have
the speed to pass him, and then it just
kind of snowballed backwards.
And Baku wasn’t a strong race,
but in a way again not really our
fault, we had tyres going off and some
brake issues.
So in the end when I look at it
Austria was the only one I personally
felt I could maybe have done
something better, but didn’t quite
understand why I was so slow.
Otherwise, I think I had a reason.
ADAM COOPER
Yeah, absolutely. And the team knew
that as well, afterwards.
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