RB’s Daniel Ricciardo reflected positively on last weekend’s Dutch Grand Prix in which the Australian finished P12, teammate Tsunoda however was disappointed by his strategy during the race.
Despite RB failing to score points in yesterday’s Dutch Grand Prix, Daniel Ricciardo was more satisfied following the race than his performance in Saturday’s qualifying. Starting from P13 on the grid, Ricciardo managed to cross the line 1 place higher in P12.
Speaking after the Grand Prix, the Australian explained he was happier with his performance compared to Saturday despite failing to crack the elusive top ten. He explained he was frustrated following qualifying on Saturday as he had failed to extract the maximum potential from his VCARB 01.
“Honestly, I was happy with the race.” Ricciardo said. “I think, just – Gasly was really strong this weekend. I know he’s had some strong races here in the past, I think with maybe the Alfa Tauri and also with the Alpine from memory. So maybe it’s just a track he kicks ass on and Alonso was quick.
“But I was there right behind Stroll. I think if we’re fighting an Aston, we know we’re kind of doing OK. So it wasn’t good enough for points, but I think we actually had a strong race. So yeah, I leave more positive than I did yesterday.
“As I said, it wasn’t like yesterday was a crisis. It was just more some internal frustration, you know, and you obviously want to start the second half of the season on point. And I felt like I didn’t start the way I envisioned. But today we picked up some of the pieces. So I’m happier with that.”
Contrary to Ricciardo’s positive outlook, teammate Yuki Tsunoda was disappointed in the outcome of the Grand Prix. The Japanese driver explained that extended stints stuck behind other drivers cost him throughout the Grand Prix and prevented him from showing the potential of the car.
Having started from P11, two places ahead of Ricciardo, Tsunoda eventually finished well behind his teammate in P17, demonstrating that the opposing strategies between the two drivers did not play out as expected.
“We split the strategy across the garage and in the end it didn’t go the way we wanted.” Tsunoda explained following the Grand Prix. “Also, I think the tyre allocation, in the end, didn’t work well, but at the same time the lap we pitted, it was too late. When I rejoined the track I was always behind cars, and stuck always in the dirty air.
“I think we didn’t execute anything from our car. I’m not blaming anything on strategy, but the timing when we did it was completely wrong.”
When asked if he was disappointed by the performance in the race, Tsunoda admitted RB were far from the pace they had anticipated throughout.
“Qualifying was alright,” he replied. “We were lacking on pace but I think I maximised what we can do from our car. To be honest, [in the] race we were way behind the place we wanted. I wanted to at least achieve something but in the end in this race we didn’t take anything. So, pretty tough.”
