While we know Daniel Ricciardo for his ear-to-ear smile and aggressive driving - earning him the nickname of 'The Honey Badger' in his earlier years - this season hasn't involved as many smiles as he'd hoped as he stepped into his first full year with RB. And it may just get worse as reports from the sport's insiders are hinting that the Australian driver may lose his seat.
This follows a series of lackluster performances, the latest being at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix where he managed only a P13 finish, trailing behind Alpine's Pierre Gasly despite the latter’s pit stop under Virtual Safety Car conditions towards the end of the race.
The race through the city of Baku was marked by tire graining issues for the RB driver. Speaking to Sky Sports, commentator Ted Kravitz summed up the situation, via Crash.net:
“Very disappointing day for them. A miserable day, actually. Ricciardo was clearly up for it, on the grid. Only P13.
“Ricciardo raced Pierre Gasly but couldn’t finish ahead of him, even when Gasly stopped on the last lap to take his mandatory tyre stop. As Gasly pitted under the Virtual Safety Car, they ended up 29 seconds behind. Not their day.
“Helmut Marko says it will be after Singapore - we have been waiting to hear who will be Yuki Tsunoda’s partner at RB next year.
“Marko is teasing that it’s now after Singapore that we will hear whether it’s going to be Ricciardo or Lawson.
“We think it’s going to be Liam Lawson.”
Helmut Marko, a prominent figure within the Red Bull camp and one that looks after the progression of its drivers, has admitted that a formal announcement regarding Ricciardo’s position in the team will be made following the upcoming Singapore Grand Prix. Speculation points to Liam Lawson as a prime candidate to replace Ricciardo, owing to his impressive stint with AlphaTauri last season.
In the aftermath of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, Ricciardo himself voiced his frustrations over his tire performance.
“It was a tough race. The start felt okay; the medium runners in front of me looked like they were struggling, and we were able to catch them. I was on the hard tire and tried to use it where I could by going long and finding the pace,” he recounted. However, severe tire graining thwarted his efforts to maintain competitiveness—a issue that perplexed even the team. “After a few laps, we picked up a lot of graining, which got worse and worse over 10 laps, causing us to be a few seconds off the pace,” he added.
"The team could see some other cars were clearing the graining, however it definitely took us a lot longer. When we did, we were able to come back and have a bit of pace again, but we had lost a lot of ground. I’ve never experienced graining like that, the swing of lap time was up to four seconds.
"We need to understand why we had more graining for longer. Looking ahead, I love the Marina Bay Street Circuit, so hopefully we can have a stronger weekend there.”
Laurent Mekies, Team Principal, echoed these concerns after the team's Baku performance was put in the hands of Ricciardo as Tsunoda's car sustained fatal damage from a clash with Lace Stroll's Aston Martin.
“This wasn’t the weekend we were hoping for. Yuki [Tsunoda] was unlucky to be involved in a collision on the first lap, while Daniel’s pace was badly affected by a huge amount of tire graining, which kept him outside of the battle for the points,” Mekies stated.
“In terms of overall performance during the weekend, no doubt that we still have a lot of work to do in front of us. The updates we brought here gave us an improvement in performance which is good news. However, it is not enough to match the progress our competitors have made and get back into the top 10 fight,” Mekies concluded.
The current season has seen Red Bull reaffirm Sergio Perez's position within the primary team, leaving limited options for Ricciardo. And with RB being a junior team, there are few places for the experienced driver to go.
With Singapore next on the calendar, the driver is hoping for a better campaign:
“When we did [clear the graining], we were able to come back and have a bit of pace again, but we had lost a lot of ground. I’ve never experienced graining like that, the swing of lap time was up to four seconds. We need to understand why we had more graining for longer. Looking ahead, I love the Marina Bay Street Circuit, so hopefully we can have a stronger weekend there,” he said.
