Daniel Ricciardo finds himself puzzled by his inability to secure a strong performance in the initial trio of races in 2024. The seasoned RB racer is among the seven drivers yet to clinch their first point this year.
His most notable finish, a 12th place, came in the recent race in Melbourne, following his failure to advance beyond Q1 during qualifying.
His teammate, Yuki Tsunoda, clinched RB’s inaugural points of the season in the preceding race in Australia, securing seventh place.
Ricciardo has managed to outpace Tsunoda only once in the opening three rounds, which was during the inaugural race of the season in Bahrain. During that event, Tsunoda was instructed to yield to Ricciardo towards the race’s end due to divergent strategies being pursued.
Nevertheless, Ricciardo remains steadfast in his confidence and comfort with his new car for 2024. Speaking to the official F1 channel, he remarked, “It’s funny because, on paper, it hasn’t been good.”
He continued, acknowledging the less-than-ideal results, yet expressing personal contentment and assurance, stating, “It’s really just a matter now of getting a result and putting a few things to rest. But internally and the place I’m in, personally, I feel really good.
“And that’s why it’s probably been a little bit weird to comprehend why the result hasn’t happened yet. But otherwise feeling good.”
Addressing concerns about potential issues with his car, Ricciardo clarified that he has not encountered significant difficulties and has devoted considerable effort to analyzing his data in collaboration with his team.
“We’ve been putting a lot of work in off-track as well in the off weeks and trying to understand how much is me, how much is the car, what is it that maybe the car’s not giving me that I’m looking for and things like this,” he explained. “It’s really just small things here and there.”
“I think what’s important now is, again, because we’re not in a place where we’re lost or I don’t feel good, I think it’s important for us just to focus on sitting down with my engineers and that’s it.
“We don’t start receiving suggestions from other people and ‘have you thought about this or do that’ because then you go down a rabbit hole that we’re certainly not willing already to go down.
“So it’s just really staying the course. Obviously it is frustrating, because I do want the results and I feel very prepared and I feel like I’m ready to get results. But we can’t get side-tracked by anything else, really.”
Despite his frustrations regarding the lack of desired results, Ricciardo mentioned spending time with family and friends in Western Australia following his home grand Prix, aiming to recharge for the upcoming round in Japan.
“I was home for a little bit as well, that was nice, always nice to get home for a few days and come here refreshed,” he shared optimistically. “Obviously I can’t predict what’s going to happen this weekend but certainly, standing here now, I feel like I can make a good result happen.”
