Ricciardo opens up on the highlight of his season

Daniel Ricciardo has reflected on his favourite moment of the 2018 season and has said that his win in Monaco was the best part. 

The Australian racer had a mixed season due to the performance of his car and multiple engine issues forcing him to retire. Ricciardo's highlight of the season was his win in Monaco which saw him win despite not being able to use gears 7 and 8 and having breaks which were overheating. 

When speaking to gpfans.com Ricciardo said that “The feeling crossing the line in Monaco was more relief than anything else because that victory was two years in the making. Don’t get me wrong, I was ecstatic, but with everything going on with the car, relief was uppermost." 

He admitted that “the car started having problems early in the race and, initially, I didn’t think I could hold on. I saw Seb [Vettel] ready to pounce and thought ‘oh boy’. I was losing so much time on the straights, the only way I could stay in front of him was to go very quickly in the corners, which was chewing up the tyres. I assumed I wouldn’t have them left to defend at the end of the race."

“After a while though, I got into a rhythm and started to believe I could hold him off – and by halfway I believed I could do it. That’s when the brakes started to fail! They became critical during a Virtual Safety Car period and the team thought we’d be retiring the car at the restart – but they didn’t tell me that!”

Riccirado announced that he would be leaving Red Bull halfway through the season, and Ricciardo believes that having that playing in his mind didn't help his performance in the second half of the season. 

Renault will hope that Ricciardo will be back to form come the start of the 2019 season.