CHINA 2024; 📸: Mark Sutton

Daniel Ricciardo

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Daniel’s pre-race squat | Shanghai 2024

I think there's been a lot of noise from outside, potentially fuelled by Liam Lawson fans, that Daniel's under pressure and he's about to get dropped, which the team says is not correct at all. They see Daniel's situation [as] similar to Carlos Sainz at the start of ‘22 when he was struggling with a car he couldn't get comfortable with. It took six or seven races to get on top of it and that's what they see with Daniel. They've been chipping away and they say the signs have been there; they saw progress in Saudi Arabia, Australia without the track limits he would have been right up there, Japan qualified really well but we didn't see the race pace because he got caught up in that crash with Alex and this weekend's been his most complete performance. They reckon he was well on for points here and then through absolutely zero fault of his own gets hit by Lance, and he's just picked up a three place grid penalty for the next race because of a safety car infringement [for] overtaking Hulkenberg. So classic Daniel Ricciardo luck, but the team's behind him, they see progress. I think it's too early to judge if the chassis made a difference, the team thinks there was nothing in it, but equally I think racing drivers, sometimes they're so complicated in how they feel everything that sometimes I think they can if they know it's a new chassis, something in their head will tell them it's an improvement so I think he's felt, it's fair to say, he's felt more comfortable this weekend; is it setup, is it car or is it new chassis - I think the final answer will come in maybe three or four races.

Jon Noble speaking on Autosport's F1 2024 Chinese Grand Prix Review

Following Lance eating his car's ass | China 2024

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"That pisses me off.”

daniel ricciardo at shanghai international airport after the chinese grand prix

daniel ricciardo stretching ahead of the chinese grand prix | 📍 shanghai international circuit | 📸 mario renzi

Oh? He's saying my mistake? Okay. I had started to calm down but now that makes me...that pisses me off. I watched his onboard...He's not even looking at me. That pisses me off.

I know a lot of people were not happy with Vcarb's stategy for Daniel today, but this is why they went long on the first set of meds, and then opted for a second medium to open a gap to slower cars behind and then chuck on a set of softs to come back through. For reference Daniel was lapping 1.5 seconds a lap faster than most of the midfield at that point, and almost a second a lap faster than Hamilton. It did genuinely look like they were in for a chance at points, but the timing of the vsc/sc really hurt Daniel's race, even if Stroll hadn't tried to send his car halfway to the next continent on the restart.

[Seb was trying to shake Daniel's hand, and Daniel tried to fist bump him]

Daniel: I was trynna give Seb knuckles, he wants to shake my hand so- the formalities were getting confused these days, people just hug.

Int: Hug it out!

Daniel: Yeah, hug it out.

[...]

[Seb fixes Daniel's sleeve while he's talking, unrolling it from where it's ridden up]

Daniel: he's even fixing my shirt! He's got good etiquette, he's a very responsible man.