“It’s a reality”– Daniel Ricciardo accepts his situation in McLaren despite recent success

“It’s a reality”– Daniel Ricciardo talks about his situation in McLaren even though he had his best performance with the team at Silverstone.

Daniel Ricciardo had a rough start with McLaren and is yet to find a podium with the Woking-based team. McLaren signed the Australian with several aspirations, and both are way away from them.

However, Ricciardo managed to fetch a P5 in the recent most race, landing him his best result with McLaren, ever since his debut with them. Yet, the 32-year-old driver is not convinced with his overall report and has accepted the reality that it will be a lengthy struggle.

“It’s still definitely at times frustrating, but I’m probably past the point of being frustrated,” said Ricciardo when asked by The Race how difficult it is to be so far into the season.

“I think now it’s a reality that I’m still needing to find some more and still be at one with the car; that’s probably the best way to put it. I guess it’s not anything new for me now. I’m aware that it’s probably still going to be a process.

“I didn’t panic at the beginning, but I was aware that I was losing ground and I was just trying to understand where am I losing and what is it that I need to get those 0.3-0.4s more.”

Not able to do it consistently

Last week, Ricciardo finished 14 seconds behind his teammate Lando Norris but was mostly pressured by Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz. According to Ricciardo, he manages to take the car to its apex but lacks consistency in it.

“It’s strange because you’d think on one lap is maybe where I’d lack more, where you’re really pushing the car on the limit and maybe the race when everything settles down, I’d have a bit more,” said Ricciardo.

“But we’ve seen the opposite this weekend. In the race, when the car is a bit lower on fuel and starts to move around a little bit more, that’s where I’ve still got to dial it in.

“It’s just the feeling and being able to really put the car on that knife edge, I’m not able to do as consistently yet. I think having Carlos on me for most of the race and putting pressure on me kind of forced me to in a way overdrive some corners, and I think that allowed me to feel a little more where that edge is.”

About the author

Tanish Chachra

Tanish Chachra is the Motorsport editor at The SportsRush. He saw his first race when F1 visited India in 2011, and since then, his romance with the sport has been seasonal until he took up this role in 2020. Reigniting F1's coverage on this site, Tanish has fallen in love with the sport all over again. He loves Kimi Raikkonen and sees a future world champion in Oscar Piastri. Away from us, he loves to snuggle inside his books.

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