“Simply continue our journey in Baku” – McLaren team principal Andreas Seidl is happy to note improvements with Daniel Ricciardo despite disappointment at the Monaco Grand Prix.
Daniel Ricciardo has not had an explosive start to his McLaren journey, agreed, but he’s been chipping in with decent performances so far. The race in Monaco was a disappointing one, with a poor qualifying keeping him out of the points on race day.
Seidl has suggested it is down to a certain kind of racing style required to drive the McLaren, much different from his previous cars at Renault and Red Bull. Some fans have even suggested the Aussie should be racing for the Mercedes works team, rather than the customer team McLaren. If that is the case, George Russell has competition to replace Valtteri Bottas.
“In order to drive our car fast at the moment, you need a special driving style, which is not natural for Daniel. That’s why it’s not easy for him to get the laps in and to extract the performance.
“We have to stay calm, keep analyzing, keep learning so he can further adapt to our car because obviously, the potential is there.”
“I think looking at his Monaco race, he was pretty much done after Turn 1 when unfortunately he lost two positions. Then there was no chance anymore to fight back into the points.
“There were periods in the race when he had free air where he could actually show what he’s able to do around Monaco. It’s important to simply put this weekend behind us together with him and then simply continue our journey in Baku.
“I think if you look back since the beginning of the season, we have made good steps forward with him.”
Also read “Mattia was right”– Nico Rosberg on Ferrari choosing Carlos Sainz over Daniel Ricciardo
