Ricciardo Resurgence: Red Bull Ace Revels in Season Turnaround
May 4 - Daniel Ricciardo is relieved to finally be getting his 2024 season on track.
Mere weeks ago, speculation was rife that Red Bull had lost patience with the Australian's ongoing struggles and would be dropped by the junior RB squad mid-season.
"If there is a change in our team, there will probably be a big favourite and that is Liam (Lawson)," admitted RB CEO Peter Bayer, according to RTBF.
"Helmut (Marko) has been clear about this. He will not hesitate to put Liam (Lawson) in the seat to find out what he is worth in the long term."
Ricciardo, 34, looked disconsolate prior to China, where the team reluctantly agreed with his request to be assigned a fresh monocoque.
"Yes, sometimes racing cars are mysterious," he smiled to DAZN in Miami. "So far they haven't found anything on the old chassis, but on paper, since we changed it, I've improved a lot.
"For now we are turning the season around and it feels good," added Ricciardo, who qualified an impressive fourth ahead of the Miami sprint race.
"They've also put a new floor on it and other improvements that are helping a lot," he said. "Hopefully is all helps to silence some critics."
Christian Horner, whose originally idea was to place Ricciardo at RB in 2024 ahead of a possible promotion to Red Bull Racing for 2025, said in Miami: "Daniel has regained his confidence and feels more and more comfortable in the car."
Ricciardo continued: "Apparently things are starting to change for me."
Also happier in Miami was Ferrari's Charles Leclerc, who qualified second behind Max Verstappen.
"The hard work I put in earlier in the season to try to get the tyres to work has now paid off. I'm glad about that, because there was so much talking," he said.
"In this sport, you perform poorly in qualifying twice in a row, and people start talking. It's good that I was able to stop that today."
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Good for DR, however, a Sprint qualifying is not the same as a 2-hour race. I think it is a little premature to say he is back on track. He hadn’t been on track for a long time. If he were, he wouldn’t be driving in RBs junior team.
A great pity that lawson cant get a drive while tsunoda and ricciardo still hang on.give liam back the seat
One sprint qualifying and fourth in the short sprint race and his season is back on track. What is wrong with you journalists.
And what is is with the title to the story Red Bull ace. He drives for RB vcarb . 8 wins in his career he is no ace. Why are you journalists and Horner so wrapped in him.
Assess his driving objectiveley not subjective and emotional based on his personality. For mine I find him talking himself up very annoying.
For the future is LL a better bet than DR , er YES... its in LL contract RB racing must give him a drive next year or he can leave, so are they just going to drop DR in 25 Or?
For the future is LL a better bet than DR , er YES... its in LL contract RB racing must give him a drive next year or he can leave, so are they just going to drop DR in 25 Or? or let LL walk?
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