Renault’s Daniel Ricciardo showed extreme emotion just after the qualifying in F1 Mexico GP, which he explained to be frustration of not being able to extract more.
Following their disqualification from F1 Japanese GP, the Mexico GP is important for Renault, who now have to defend fifth in the constructors’ championship from Racing Point and Toro Rosso, while also push on for fourth against McLaren.
To recover, Renault sought for a faultless weekend, but hydraulic issues in FP3 threw a spanner in the works for the French outfit, as they lost precious running with both Daniel Ricciardo and Nico Hulkenberg time prior to qualifying.
The qualifying then went equally as poorly for the team, as they were both knocked out in Q2 with Hulkenberg leading in 12th and Ricciardo 13th. The latter felt he let the hard-working team down as he was seen swearing in frustration in weigh-in area.
“After the lap, I wanted to do better,” said Ricciardo to TV media. “I wanted to do more. The team did an awesome job to kind of, again, get ourselves out of a situation. I don’t think it’s something we ask for again but it’s unfortunately how it’s been going lately.
“I don’t want to say ‘poor us’, it is what it is, but yeah, all the boys were up late last night [and up] early this morning, getting both cars ready for quali. I just wish I could have done more, and I think that’s the frustration. I wish I could be the hero.
“And bring everyone up and when I say ‘I wish’, I actually believe I can. I think that’s where the rage comes from in myself. I know it wasn’t easy, already we struggled on Friday, so missing the track this morning hurt us.
“But then again, I probably sound like I was expecting too much from myself, but there is a part of me that does believe I can do it. So, that’s where it [the anger] comes from.” Ricciardo has been carrying load along with Hulkenberg since the 2019 start.
https://twitter.com/LaRazon_mx/status/1188167207873855493?s=20
The performance has been up and down all year but they are losing out to their customer team. Hulkenberg, however, found that 12th was the best achievable outcome of the hour-long session, taking into consideration the situation in the session prior.
“Given the circumstances, we’ll take twelfth on the grid,” he said. “It was difficult to prepare for qualifying without the morning run, so it was a bit of a cold start for us. The mechanics did a great job to prepare the car in time so credit to them for their effort.
“I think we have a race on our hands, especially as we have a free choice of tyres and some flexibility on strategy. It might work in our favour as our race pace has looked good recently.” Both Ricciardo and Hulkenberg will be itching for points.
The confidence seems dented by the happenings between Japan and Mexico, especially with Cyril Abiteboul admitting of the brake bias system in place since Lotus time. At the same time, the manufacturer has put F1 under review ahead of 2021 signing.
Here’s what Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull Racing reaction to qualifying
Here’s what the stewards stated to penalise Max Verstappen
The story was written by Duncan Leahy and edited by Darshan Chokhani