Home favourite Daniel Ricciardo believes that he and Red Bull will be able to deliver their most competitive Australian Grand Prix showing at the 2018 Formula 1 season-opener.
In recent season’s Red Bull has struggled in the opening race after winter testing periods hampered by unreliability or aerodynamic performance issues.
However, Red Bull’s new challenger – the RB14 – posted impressive times during testing at Barcelona and was far more reliable than its predecessors. The team was believed to be second behind Mercedes on the fuel corrected overall timesheet.
Ricciardo, competing in his seventh Australian Grand Prix, is confident that a strong winter for the team will translate into a positive result on his home turf.
When asked if this weekend’s race will be his strongest season-opening race for a while, Ricciardo replied; “I believe so.
“We had a good winter. It’s all there in front of us now. I think we’re still the top three teams – Merc, Ferrari and us. I think we’re still going to be leading the pack for now.
“So hopefully we’ll be deep in that group and have a chance to stand up on the podium.”
Ricciardo did stand on the podium in Melbourne back in 2014, after finishing second in his first race for Red Bull. However, he was later disqualified as a result of a fuel flow infringement.
He has subsequently never achieved a podium finish in Australia, with a best result of fourth in 2016.
Last season, unreliability struck pre-race as Ricciardo broke down on his reconnaissance lap. He was unable to join the grid and while the team managed to eventually resolve the issue and send Ricciardo out several laps down, he later retired with a fuel cell fault.
“It has to be more fun [this year],” he added. “Not starting last year wasn’t fun at all. So it has to be more fun.
“Even little things. Last year we missed the anthem on the grid because I was in the garage trying to get the thing going, or be there for when it got going.
“I missed a lot of the Sunday build-up, which was not fun. For sure this preparation is going to mean more fun this weekend and we’ll see where that fun takes us.”
