McLaren’s fold rebounded like a phoenix in the third race of the weekend in this year’s Formula 1 season. The Woking-based team climbed to fifth and sixth in Australia after two point-free races, which saw the team finish on the podium.
Daniel Ricciardo, who started in sixth, praised the 58-lap race despite the fact that he was increasingly behind the Mercedes in front of them, Towards the end of the race they were asked not to attack the sick Lando Norris.
“I am satisfied,” said the 32-year-old pilot, who was able to start in 2019 at the Formula 1 race in Hungary due to the pandemic. “This is by far the best result we’ve had this year. At the start of the race, I was hoping we could do something with Mercedes, but as the laps ended, they got more and more advantages.”
“It looked like a target photo with Lando at the end. I was told he was having problems at the end, so he slowed down a bit. The team told me to be rational now, so I had to back off a bit. Fifth and sixth is still a huge achievement for us. If someone had told me In Bahrain with that, I would laugh, like this I am satisfied with our development. ”
Back on the racing calendar, Australia was waiting for the field with several changes to the track, which Ricciardo said improved the quality of the race. Despite that, and the three DRS zones, we could see relatively little overtaking on the track.
“I feel like we managed to move forward, but there is still potential in that. Because of the short braking distances, it is still difficult to attack, but that does not require another conversion,” added the Australian.
