Daniel Ricciardo

I noticed young Daniel didn't have his own thread so thought I'd give him on as sure he'll be around for a good few years.

Born in 1989 (that makes him 22 before you do the maths) this aussie started karting at the age of 9 and in 2005 entered the Western Australian Formula Ford Championship as a privateer driving a car that was 15 years old at the time and managed to finish 8th. He won a scholarship to compete in Formula BMW Asia the following year. As we all know he eventually became involved in the Red Bull young driver programme after winning the British Formula 3 championship in 2009.

Became Red Bull's test driver and has now stepped up to drive for HRT. Has been really hyped as the next big thing by the Red Bull team and the press. Eddie Jordan described him as a future world champion before he'd even done his first Grand Prix. The truth is though he has not set the world alight at HRT. How can one set the world alight at HRT I hear you ask to which I say - good point! Although he has beaten Liuzzi twice already in the races I believe he needs to get on top of him in quali too. Also he's being beaten by quite a way in the Formula Renault 3.5 Series by both Robert Wickens and Jean-Eric Vergne.

So Ricciardo - future number 1 or going going gone?
 
All the usual excuses apply: poor car, lack of testing, inexperience, etc. but you are right Rasputin. We expected a whole heap more than we are seeing. Liuzzi is no slouch, but DR needs to outqualify him to deserve the hype we heard.
 
I always found that they hype around him wasn't going to do him any justice...yes he set a faster lap than Vettel by a few tenths in Abu Dhabi end of season testing, but that was when the track was fully rubbered.

But I have yet to see him make a mistake, maybe that's because the camera's never on the HRT's or maybe it's because he is doing a good job.

I think Red Bull are trying to rush him into F1 too quickly, they did the same with Alguersuari, and I wouldn't be happy if he replaced a certain Moose at Toro Rosso, or Alguersuari (wouldn't mind if that means Buemi would stay on :D), I think both (Buemi and Alguersuari) are doing a good job, and should be given another season.
 
"He's a future world champion" says Eddie Jordan

Well the first thing Mr Future World Champion needs to do is make sure he finishes in front of Narain Karthikeyan in the standings - especially as he's had the same car as him or the majority of the races!

To do that he needs a 16th place finish to beat Narain's 2 17th places in Monoco and Canada. I'd be preying for a wet race to help you out Danial otherwise the 'Beaten by Karthikeyan' stat is gonna follow you around whatever you do!
 
To do that he needs a 16th place finish to beat Narain's 2 17th places in Monoco and Canada. I'd be preying for a wet race to help you out Danial otherwise the 'Beaten by Karthikeyan' stat is gonna follow you around whatever you do!

Even if that's the case I doubt that will ruin his reputation since Red Bull seem very keen on him
 
"He's a future world champion" says Eddie Jordan

Well the first thing Mr Future World Champion needs to do is make sure he finishes in front of Narain Karthikeyan in the standings - especially as he's had the same car as him or the majority of the races!

To do that he needs a 16th place finish to beat Narain's 2 17th places in Monoco and Canada. I'd be preying for a wet race to help you out Danial otherwise the 'Beaten by Karthikeyan' stat is gonna follow you around whatever you do!

Personally I am going to be looking at how fast he is compared to Liuzzi in qually. With the HRT, you can spend so much of your race being blue flagged that it is hard to judge a driver based on results, especially when you only get good results when others drop out (ie through no result of your own talents or lack thereof).
 
Ricciardo was only 0.022s faster than Kartikeyan in qualifying for India. That's not really what I was expecting, given the relative "standings" of each. Danny is going to struggle for a drive next year at this rate. Any mitigating factors?
 
There's nothing in the post-qualifying quotes from the team - he had to change a gearbox after FP3 but that was completed before qualifying.

I suspect Narain pulled something exceptional out of the bag for his home race, but even so Daniel ought to be disappointed with that really.
 
He didn't do much running in FP3, as the gearbox was being changed, which compromised his preparation for qualifying.
 
and now Mr Ricciardo has the Kartikeyan stain on his name for the rest of his career. Danial has not set the world alight has he? Has he stuffed his chance of a Toro Rosso seat up? Would you take him over Buemi or Alguersauri?
 
Something I had overlooked and yesterday's Autosport drew to my attention - Ricciardo's second pit stop in India was unscheduled due to a suspected puncture. Had it not been for this, they suggest, he would have finished ahead of Karthikeyan.

Elsewhere in the magazine they still indicate him as likely to get a Toro Rosso seat for next season.
 
Yeah he actually said this after the race as well:

“The first laps weren’t great but then I managed to pass a few people. Some laps later I got past Narain and set a good rhythm; I was happy with the first stint as everything was going well, the balance was good and the tyres were performing well. In the second stint I felt a strange feeling in the front of the car after a couple of laps, the car was moving quite a bit from left to right, I still don’t know the reason for this but it might have been a puncture. It’s a shame because as a cause we had to do an extra pit stop and lost quite a bit of time with that. In the third stint, once we found our pace we were quite competitive. It ruined the rhythm of our race but hopefully we can avoid it from happening next time.”

So just unlucky then.
 
Sounds like it - I shall take what I said earlier back.

Abu Dhabi is a big one for him though as I think its the first F1 track he's racing on that he actually knows so he really should get the legs on Liuzzi. Could be make or break.
 
I don't think Ricciardo has done badly vs Liuzzi! These are finishing positions by the way!

f-one.webp
 
Maybe I am being too harsh too, but I have become used to seeing future world champions do something special in their first year. You cant expect consistency, but I have seen flashes in the treats that i have seen emerge: Senna, Schumacher and Vettel. Lewis and Fernando also did pretty well in year 1, so did Jenson. I was looking for something like that from Ricciardo and I just havent.

I guess by most drivers standards, he has done ok, but I think we were looking at him being something better than ok. Poor bloke...
 
Maybe I am being too harsh too, but I have become used to seeing future world champions do something special in their first year. You cant expect consistency, but I have seen flashes in the treats that i have seen emerge: Senna, Schumacher and Vettel. Lewis and Fernando also did pretty well in year 1, so did Jenson. I was looking for something like that from Ricciardo and I just havent.

I guess by most drivers standards, he has done ok, but I think we were looking at him being something better than ok. Poor bloke...

I think the fact that he has beat Luizzi in most of races they have been together for is praise in itself. With Luizzi's experience you perhaps wouldn't expect that to be the case and indeed Luizzi isn't that slow either... so I think Daniel is doing pretty good, definitely more than ok.
 
There have been plenty of guys being dubbed future world champion and some never even made it to F1

There is a lot of hype around him . His raw speed is there when he's been asked to drive in the Toro Rosso and Red Bull

Red Bull have a young driver development programme and they have had a few donkeys along the way like

Klein and Bernoldi ( remember him!)

As for Ricciardo everyone said the same thing about Bruno Senna last year so we'll have to wait for wet weather or when he is in a half decent car to show himself his abilities
 
I think the fact that he has beat Luizzi in most of races they have been together for is praise in itself. With Luizzi's experience you perhaps wouldn't expect that to be the case and indeed Luizzi isn't that slow either... so I think Daniel is doing pretty good, definitely more than ok.

Liuzzi has had a lot of bad luck the last 3 races, Suzuka he only got 2 laps in practice, none in qualifying, Korea he had to go for most of the lap with a broken front wing. Something happened in another race which I can't remember.

I have to say, Liuzzi is quite unlucky, had to share a race seat with Klien (can't remember that story correctly, but he was meant to have the second Red Bull seat), then with Force India he was in the points several times but problems occured, mechanical, bad luck, and some of his own doing, and has now been demoted to Hispania. He's getting compared to Ricciardo unfairly, when Ricciardo beats him most praise him without knowing what's happened, when it's the other way round Ricciardo was "unlucky" or had a "problem".
 
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