Ricciardo left stunned by the pace of the Mercedes

Daniel Ricciardo was pleased with his performance in yesterday’s practice sessions but was shocked at how fast Hamilton was. The Mercedes were running with a new spec engine after it had been delayed in Canada. 

The Red Bull boys finished 2nd and 3rd in the second session, but Ricciardo was still 0.704s behind the fastest driver Lewis Hamilton. The Aussie went on to confirm his day of running went to plan. 

“I thought we were relatively fast, but then we saw the time of Lewis and the long runs were a bit more up and down,” Ricciardo said in an interview on f1i.com. 

“Obviously Lewis was pretty quick, that’s a bit of a shame, he obviously did a good lap. Hopefully, they used it [the new engine] today. If they’re going to go quicker, then it looks like everyone is chasing them this weekend.” 

Moving towards Sunday’s race, Ricciardo feels confident his RB14 can improve its performance on the Paul Ricard track. 

“I think we can keep improving. Today was a good day to get a lot of information. I think the downforce level is a question mark,” added Ricciardo.