Turkish Grand Prix – Daniel Ricciardo relapses
After his victory in Monza and a fourth place in Sochi, Ricciardo fell back into his old ways in Turkey while his teammate, Lando Norris, once again secures good points.
It all started badly during Saturday’s qualifying. The Australian got trapped in Q1 (even Schumacher got past him) with a disappointing sixteenth time. Nevertheless, McLaren “took advantage” of this poor result to equip its driver with a new engine block, which only made him lose four places, while Hamilton lost ten in the meantime. For Daniel Ricciardo, this Turkish Grand Prix was supposed to be synonymous with an attacking race, the objective being to finish ahead of Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari (who started alongside him) to allow the Woking team to maintain its lead in the constructors’ standings, with both teams fighting for third place.
But as the Spaniard from the Scuderia was overtaking his competitors one by one (he will finish in eighth place just four seconds behind Lando Norris), Ricciardo quickly found himself stuck behind George Russell’s Williams and never found an opening. The Australian therefore attempted a gamble by diving into the pit lane as early as the 21st lap. “I don’t want to use the word desperation,” he said after the race to explain this early stop, “but I had to try something because I had been stuck behind Russell for at least ten laps. I saw Carlos making his way through the traffic but I couldn’t do it. As soon as I was behind someone, the car was no longer maneuverable. So I thought I would be faster in clean air and with new tires.”
After his pit stop, Ricciardo was lapping in 1’34″9 (six tenths faster than when he was stuck behind Russell) compared to 1’34″6 for his teammate, despite being on worn tires, a sign of a real lack of pace for the McLaren bearing the number four. Daniel Ricciardo will ultimately never break into the top ten throughout the race and will lose his eleventh position to the Alfa Romeos of Giovinazzi and Räikkönen on the penultimate lap.
Ferrari, having scored twelve more points than McLaren this weekend, the Italian team now has only a 7.5-point deficit to its English rival in the constructors’ championship (240 points for McLaren against 232.5 points for Ferrari). The team based in Woking will definitely need Ricciardo’s return to form to resist the red army in this end of the season.
