‘A lot more promise’: Ricciardo improves with sixth place in Melbourne

When you’ve won eight grands prix and become one of the biggest names in Formula One over a decade-long career, sixth place isn’t normally anything to get too excited about.

But given how dire Daniel Ricciardo’s season had been before arriving at Albert Park for his home race, sixth place in Sunday’s Australian Grand Prix was cause for a minor celebration, and a major dose of optimism for McLaren after a wretched opening to 2022.

Daniel Ricciardo put in his best performance of the season in Melbourne.Credit: Getty Images

Ricciardo had a disastrous month before Melbourne, including a COVID-19 infection that left him sidelined for pre-season testing, an anonymous 14th place in Bahrain and a mechanical failure in Saudi Arabia. It left the Australian second-last in the drivers’ championship, depths he’s not experienced since he was a rookie in 2011.

Ricciardo was hopeful that Albert Park’s revised fast and flowing layout would mitigate McLaren’s inherent problems in slow-speed corners, and his optimism proved well-founded. He finished four-tenths of a second behind teammate Lando Norris (fifth) as McLaren bagged 18 constructors’ championship points to triple the meagre six they’d scavenged from the first pair of races.

“The best way to sum up the weekend is ‘we’ll take that,’” a buoyant Ricciardo said after improving to 11th place in the championship.

“After Bahrain I was very positive and knew we could make a turnaround, but I didn’t think it would happen by race three, so I’m glad I got to do it at home. The weekend as a whole has been smoother, and we’ve shown a lot more promise.”

Ricciardo’s McLaren performed better on the revised Melbourne track.Credit: Eddie Jim

Ricciardo’s race was a 58-lap tease after he held station at the start, maintaining seventh place following his best qualifying effort at home in seven years. He shadowed Norris after his British teammate made a hash of his start from fourth and dropped two positions, and sat within a second of the sister McLaren for much of the race, briefly jumping up to fourth before his sole pit stop of the race on lap 21.

Ricciardo’s one brief heart-in-mouth moment was a near-miss with the Williams of Alex Albon when he came out of the pits on tyres not at optimum working temperature.

“I think parts of my race were certainly more competitive, at the beginning I felt strong on the medium [compound of tyre],” he said.

“On the hard [tyre], the last three-quarters of the race I felt I drifted back, so there some parts of the race I can chip away it. But the team result was mega compared to the last two [races].”

When reigning world champion Max Verstappen retired from the race as his Red Bull broke down with 19 laps to go, McLaren were a nailed-on fifth and sixth. Norris was too far adrift of Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes to snare fourth, and Ricciardo was under little pressure from Albon behind. Given Ricciardo spent all 58 laps inside the top 10 after not spending a single lap in the points this year before Melbourne, Sunday represented a significant breakthrough.

Ricciardo’s methodical race was in direct contrast to a manic week at home, with crowds flocking back to the track after two years without the race in Melbourne. Ricciardo eschewed staying in a glitzy inner-city hotel this week, choosing instead to rent a house to be alongside family and friends and using his home race to reconnect after being locked out of his native Western Australia for much of 2021.

Making an abnormal week of attention as normal as possible by being around his nephew and niece in his rare moments of downtime restored his energy and offered fuel for the soul, and made him appreciate the moment more.

“When I got out of the car there was a really loud cheer, and I thought ‘if this is the cheer for sixth, I couldn’t imagine winning here or even a podium,’” he grinned.

“If that happens … it’d be awesome. I might have to keep my earplugs in.”

News, results and expert analysis from the weekend of sport sent every Monday. Sign up for our Sport newsletter.