F1 | Azerbaijan GP | “I don't think we were quick enough to challenge Fernando,” says Daniel Ricciardo after eventful race
After a clean start from P11 and P12, both McLaren drivers had difficulties during the race which did not give them chance to go past the Alpine driver. In the end they managed to score points for the team by finishing P8 and P9.
McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo started the Azerbaijan Grand Prix from P12, just behind his teammate Lando Norris. A VSC for Kevin Magnussen's broken down Haas allowed the Australian to pit and jump his teammate after staying behind him in the first stint because of team orders.
The Australian driver expresses how he feels happy with the results and bringing home points, as it was an eventful race with DNFs from the Ferraris and an issue for Tsunoda allowing McLaren to score points with both cars.
“I’m happy to have scored some points, obviously for the team and for myself – it’s been a while. It was an eventful race with split strategies, so at the beginning I was a bit quicker than Lando on the Hard tyre, and there were some team orders, and then at the end he was quicker on the Hard and there were further team orders,” says Ricciardo.
Both Ricciardo and teammate Norris also encountered Alpine’s Fernando Alonso, who gave them a hard time as they could not get past him to score a better result and ended up behind him at the end of the race.
“Ultimately, I don't think we were quick enough to challenge Fernando, as even if we got close on the straight, he was just so quick. So, obviously we’ve got to try and take a bit of drag out the car. That was our Achilles’ heel here this weekend – but otherwise, I think we maximised our result. I’m happy to have had a smoother weekend.”
From P12 to P8, and on one stop. A stellar drive from the Honey Badger! 🍯🦡#AzerbaijanGP 🇦🇿 pic.twitter.com/6h6AnjcwiL
— McLaren (@McLarenF1) June 12, 2022
